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RANDOM pi^sTS 



Odds and Ends 



From an Angler's Note Book, 



JIew York ; 
DERBY BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS,, 

27 Park Place. 

1 8 7 ? ■ 









§ LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, \ 



Chap. 
Shelf 






i UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



RANDOM CASTS; 



OR 



ODDS AND ENDS 



From an Angler's Note Book, 



BY 



u E.M.E. 



JTew Jork: 

DERBY BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, 
27 Park Place. 

1878. 






Copyright by Derby Brothees, 
1878. 



TO MY FRIEND, 

CHARLES M. GRAVES, 

THIS LITTLE VOLUME 

IS 

AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED. 



" Oh ! the sweet contentment, 
The countryman doth find ! 

Heigh trolallie, lolle lee, 

Heigh trolallie, lee. 
That quiet contemplation 
Possesseth all my mind. 

Throw care away, 

And wend along with me." 



f 



Walton. 









k : 



dojrviwvg. 



I.- — Dogs. Catching one. Ride to Morehouseville. At 
Becrafts. 

II. — Memory and Hope. A Fairy Story. The Angler's 
Sabbath. Regular Habits. 

III. — Guides. Spruce Lake. Solitude. On a Raft. First 
Day's Fishing. 

IV.— Early Rising. A Contrary Wind. The True Angler. 
A Trout Fight. Wilgus. 

V. — First Things. My First Trout. A Leaky Shanty. 
Wilgus and the Panther. 

VI. — In the Woods. Pleasant Companions. A Summer's 
Nooning. A Pipe of Tobacco. 

VII. — Jessups River. Wet Feet and Tight Boots. Creek 
Fishing. Loosing a Trout. Suicide. 

VIII.— Down the River. Pretty Things. A Quixotic At- 
tempt. Discharge of Wilgus. 



IX.— Sunrise. The Old Whisky Bottle. Strategic Angling. 
Life and the Stream. 

X. — A Warm Tramp. The Upper Stillwater and High 
Falls. Our Shanty. A Long Night. 

XL — No Luck. Black Flies and Musquitoes. A Short 
Lecture. Pictures in the Fire. " Gluck Auf." 

XII. — Snoring Sunday Morning. The Haunted Church. 
Dinner. 

XIII.— Sabbath Breaking. Night up a Tree. Forest Lessons- 
Fly Fishing. Good Night. 



CHAPTER I. 

Dogs — catching one — Ride to Morehousevillk— 
at Becraft's. 

REMARKS our fat friend Senior: " It is a say- 
ing old as yonder hill that you cannot teach 
an old dog new tricks, but I intend to demon- 
strate to your entire satisfaction, gentlemen, that 
they can be taught to dispense with the perfor- 
mance of some of their old ones.'' 

Says Grey : " I have no idea, my well fed 
friend, that your remarks have a personal ap- 
plication to any gentleman of our party, and 
although the shoe does not fit me, still, you have 
aroused a little of my latent curiosity and I will 
relieve my anxiety by asking what is the mean- 
ing of your very commonplace affirmation." 

" Had you ridden or driven over the road we 
journey to-day as many times as I have, your 
curiosity would not have been irritated to the 
extent of dubbing my remarks as commonplace. 
Still, I forgive you my boy, as I well know your 



10 RANDOM CASTS. 



kindness of heart overbalances many times the 
infirmities of your temper." ' 

This, at Ned Williams' well kept hostelry at 
Forest House, one day in early June. A party 
of fishermen were on their way to Hamilton 
Co., for a couple of weeks trout fishing. Senior 
had just returned from a foraging expedition in 
the tavern kitchen and disclosed as a successful 
result of it, a large piece of raw beef. As he 
explained the disposition he intended to make 
of it, his eyes plainly said : 

" Mischief thou art afoot." 

his nose suddenly attained a scarlet rubicundity, 
which Bardolph might well have looked upon 
with envious eyes and his cheeks saw the beacon 
light and passed its warning up to his forehead, 
which in its turn signalled the bald spot on his 
crown. It was not the modest blush of maiden- 
hood, nor the roguish flushing of harmless devil- 
try, but the glowing earnestness of impending 
revenge. The way the red blood flashed up and 
went its rounds was a living illustration of the 
beacon lights of the old Anglo-Saxon times. 
Having reached headquarters and performed its 
mission, it gradually subsided leaving the full 



RANDOM CASTS. II 



moon face of Senior looking as childlike and in- 
nocent as a South Down. 

At a farm house on the road leading north 
from Forest House, was a dog that for many a 
long day had been the terror of little boys and 
girls and for excursions innumerable, the annoy- 
ance of hunters and fishermen, for no party of 
mirthful disciples of Nimrod or of Walton could 
drive past the gate where he kept watch, but 
the ugly brute almost invariably made an attack 
in the rear, following until he had made himself 
hoarse, and made the air fairly ring with his 
deep gruff gutterals. None had dared to shoot 
him, as the report of a gun would have surely 
detected the shooter, so every one who chanced 
to be an object of the dog's dislike, was obliged 
to grin and bear it; but a day of retribution 
was coming, a day of sorrow for our noisy, 
barking enemy. 

There is no truer more devoted friend to man 
than a dog; there can be no greater enemy 
when they have sufficient cause, for their mem- 
ory of good and bad treatment rarely forsakes 
them, but for what reason this overgrown shaggy 
specimen of the canine species should cherish to- 



12 RANDOM CASTS. 

wards us such a warlike feeling was beyond our 
comprehension, for, as Logan said of the pale 
faces : 

" We never did harm to him.** 

The dog is said to be capable of correction and 
if he possesses the faculty of reasoning, as is 
claimed for him, a wholesome lesson imparted 
to him may be for his good, teaching him that 
it were better to be a gentlemanly dog in ap- 
pearance at least, even if 

" He may smile and be a villain still. 

Senior had prepared a stout linen line with a 
No. 9 — o Limerick hook baited with a tempting 
piece of beef, rich, red and rare enough to tempt 
an epicure. As we drove past, the old enemy 
came dashing towards us, giving assurance of 
the belligerent spirit within him, by a series of 
deep roaring growls, but a peace maker catches 
his eye, the voice for a moment is hushed, and 
with one savage spring the hidden steel is in 
his jaws. Tige, Fido, or whatever his name was, 
had evidently fasted. A jerk from Senior, fast- 
ened the hook, a sting of the whip, from Grey, 
starts the horses to a keen jump and the way 
that dog straightened the line was a caution 



RANDOM CASTS. 



even to shark fishermen. Away we went like 
Tarn O'Shanter, with the witches after him. 
Senior by no manner of means evinced as much 
patience and forgiveness as Newton did towards 
his little dog Diamond, when he tumbled Sir 
Isaac's mathematical papers into the fire, and 
received as his punishment only a word gently 
and sorrowfully spoken. Senior's disposition on 
the present occasion was the other extreme, for 
he gave utterance to the satisfaction he felt in a 
manner more emphatic than elegant, and now 
that he had his ancient enemy in his power, he 
was going to cancel the debt and have a balance 
due him. Away we went. How the dust did 
fly and how that dog did travel and scratch 
gravel for one good mile, belching forth mean- 
while a perfect tornado of discordant tortuous 
sounds. 

" Revenge is sweet," so saith the poet, but 
even the spirit of revenge, deep-seated as it was 
within us, could no longer endure the torturing 
howls that pierced our ears, so the line was de- 
vided and the dog returned as fast as did the 
schoolmaster of Sleepy Hollow, when the head- 
less horseman followed him from his visit to the 



14 RANDOM CASTS. 



fair Katrina. He returned with hook and line 
sad memorials of his greediness and bad temper, 
returned we hope a wiser and better dog. If 
not a better dog, he was assuredly a wiser one, 
for since our catching him he has not been 
known to disturb the peace of the harmless, but 
on the approach of a party he may be seen like 
the solitary horseman of the novelist, wending 
his weary way towards the barn or around a 
corner of the house. 

There are four of us bowling along in the 
wagon. First Mr. Senior, the oldest and the 
fattest of the crowd, as jovial and honest a man 
as ever broke bread or emptied a glass. Unlike 
Shakespear's sixth age of man 

" With spectacles on nose and pouch on side 
His youthful hose well sewed a world too wide, 
For his shrunk shank." 

he was more like Mouter Van Twillen, about 
five feet six in height and six feet five around his 
principal organ of digestion, which protruded 
like the bay window of a house. It was always 
a surprise to strangers to see so clumsy looking 
a man tramping through the woods, or wading 
trout streams. He was jolly as he was fat, and 



RANDOM CASTS. I 5 



pleasant words were continually tumbling over 
each other as they fell from his mouth. 

Mr. Grey, a fractional part of Senior, as re- 
gards age or avoirdupois, for Senior beats him 
nearly two to one either way — but Grey can dis- 
tance him casting a fly or playing a trout. Grey 
is a thoroughly experienced sportsman, who has 
dropped prairie chickens in the West, duck in 
the South, fished in the Adirondacks, among 
the Thousand Islands of the St. Lawrence and 
among the mountain streams of West Virginia, 
Colorado and the Eastern States. A lover of 
good living, he always makes the best of every- 
thing and strings dull care and bad luck up by 
the heels and his example is usually, as it invar- 
iable should be, contagious. 

Mr. Gould, yet in his noviciate as an angler, 
but taking to it as naturally as a duck takes to 
water. 

Mr. Storm is an odd sort of fellow, who indul- 
ges his fondness for fishing whenever he has an 
opportunity and sometimes oftener, Sundays ex- 
cepted. He is in just the company he likes and 
bound to have a good time at the sport he loves 
best of all. 



1 6 RANDOM CASTS. 

Our horses sped nimbly along as if imbued 
with our own joyous spirits ; the rattle of the 
wagon startling the chattering squirrels and 
away they scamper to the topmost branches of 
the tall trees and peep down with curious eyes 
upon the noisy load below. Robins, field-spar- 
rows, meadow-larks dart out from their nests in 
the grass or on the trees. A whole season of 
song and sunshine is before them and they make 
the air trill and pulsate with volumes of ten- 
derest melody. Over murmuring streams, past 
blossoming gardens, rich pastures, fine mead- 
ows, greenest glades, orchards dropping in 
silent showers the delicate pinky apple-blossoms 
and strewing the emerald sod with fragrance, 
shaded cottages with flower laden vines climb- 
ing over their sides, now catching momentary 
glimpses of the distant mountains as we pass 
from beneath the many shade trees or rise some 
hillock in the road. Everything on all sides and 
in the sky above foster the hope that there are 
days of pleasure in store for us. 

Twenty miles over a fair country road, brings 
us to Ohio City. Beyond this there is only one 
rough bad spot in the road, but that spot ex- 



RANDOM CASTS. iy 



tends about sixteen miles, the entire distance to 
Becrafts. Positively shocking, patent-leathers 
would say. It is much better that the road is 
so difficult and fatiguing, else the place would 
be overrun with so-called anglers who are too 
indolent and delicate to endure a rough wagon 
ride. The hills and rocky roads protect many 
a poor trout : but for a person who loves a little 
variety in travel, there is a certain charm in this 
slowly climbing up steep hills, rumbling over 
rocks, fathoming deep ruts, jolting over cordu- 
roy roads and dashing peirmell over rickety 
bridges. 

Excepting with Senior our avoirdupois had 
been materially reduced by the perpetual shak- 
ing we had undergone since leaving Ohio City 
and before Becraft's was reached. Little matter 
how tired one may feel at the end of the journey, 
the hearty welcome and cordial greeting Mrs. 
Becraft extends is perfect repose. If you arrive 
immediatedly after breakfast, she will start an- 
other in almost no time. So with dinner, so 
with supper. If in the middle of night you 
arrive, you will find the latch string hanging out- 
side. Pull and enter. You cannot take her by 



1 8 RANDOM CASTS. 



surprise, and while you remain beneath her roof 
you are at home. 

Good landlords and landladies, like poets and 
anglers are, " born not made," and this one is of 
Nature's own moulding, born for the business of 
taking care of wandering humanity. Not one 
of that numerous class, who give short answers 
with an air of magnificent importance, but one 
who receives and listens to you with cordial 
and unaffected hospitality. It is one of the 
places where a stranger can enter, sling his hat 
in a corner and make up his mind that so long 
as he conducts himself like a true angler, the 
best in the house is his and welcome. 

The house itself is a substantial one, built by 
honest day's work. No contract about it. There 
is no fragility and gingerbread ornaments de- 
facing it. It partakes rather of the strength 
and cohesion of a tough beefsteak. The inter- 
nal establishment was stamped with the mono- 
gram of thrift, abundance and neatness, and had 
one feature peculiarly acceptable to Senior, for 
he is in stature considerably below the average of 
mankind, and that was, the chairs were adapted 
to the length of the legs attached to the bodies 



RANDOM CASTS. 19 

of the visitors. There was not offered to the 
little man, barely measuring five feet, a chair 
high enough for the six footer, but every man 
could find a chair to fit him. 

" Oh ! that all landlords and landladies," said 
Senior, " were as considerate ; Oh ! that all 
chairmakers felt that short men had rights 
which tall men were bound to respect. Oh ! 
that all of them had some regard and thought 
for the poor fellows whom their Maker had af- 
flicted with short legs, and not oblige them to 
set sideways on high chairs and swing one leg 
in the air." 

CHAPTER II. 

" The first men that our Saviour dear, 
Did choose to wait upon him here, 
Blest fishers were, and fish the last 
Food was that he on earth did taste ; 
I therefore strive to follow those, 
Whom He to follow Him hath chose.' 

Walton. 



W*"Q«m 



" Take my advice and let the trout alone on a Sunday, and 
become fishers of thought, drawing bright and good things 
out of the depths of memory. They will rise to your cast with 
great freedom, and take hold strongly and it is a pleasure to 
land them, and once secure they become an enjoyable posses- 
sion." W. C. Prime. 



20 RANDOM CASTS. 



Memory and Hope — A Fairy Story — The Angler's 
Sabbath — Regular Habits. 

JJERE we are once more near the old familiar 
fishing grounds. With what ecstacy of joy 
does one look forward to a renewal of his ac- 
quaintance with rod and line. How often when 
the ermine snow covers the ground, when the 
long winter evenings are joyless and dreary, do 
you think and speak of the many days of pleas- 
ure, passed among the sparkling gems and 
dancing streams, where the lovely trout disport, 
building airy castles as you look lovingly forward 
to the spring sunshine, when the snow begins to 
melt on the mountain tops and countless streams 
seek the level of the lakes and large rivers ; 
when the Ice king, who for months has sealed 
the babbling brook, the mountain torrents, the 
placid lake, the wide river has unwillingly re- 
leased them from his freezing embrace, when all 
running streams tripping gaily and coquettishly 
along offer you their bounties of golden glories. 
Memory when she recalls pleasant scenes, 
faces and thoughts and Hope, when she points 
the finger of promise towards the future, sweet- 



RANDOM CASTS. 2 I 



en the cup of life. Memory has enshrined no 
brighter thoughts than of the hours whiled 
away on the wood girdled lakes, on the shady 
banks of prattling brooks, by mossy rocks in shy 
little nooks, where the air we breathe is purest, 
the sky above the clearest, the water with 
which we quench our thirst, so clear, cold and 
sparkling, that one becomes even oblivious of his 
customary lager; the moss and grass on which 
we rest our weary limbs, the softest, where 
through the emerald leaves of the forest trees 
the gentle wind breathes the saddest, sweetest 
music, the feathered songsters pour out their un- 
taught melody ; where you can indulge your 
thoughts and fancies in a thousand devious 
wanderings, where the mornings come early 
and the evenings tarry late, and you look only 
on the bright sunny side of life, for the while un- 
conscious that there is such a thing as sin in the 
world, and all heedless of old Father Time, with 
his scythe and hour-glass, your surroundings 
are suggestive only of the pleasantest of pleas- 
ant thoughts. 

When far removed from these scenes, hemmed 
in by the high walls of a city, how often does 



22 RANDOM CASTS. 



memory revert to them, making ypu pant for 
the wild breath of the mountain air. If you are 
no lover of winter and are gloomy from impa- 
tience to live over again the experience of your 
lake and forest life, there stands Hope, smiling 
at and saying to you, when the April sun and 
showers have softened the earth, starting the 
fresh buds and trees to new life, inviting the 
birds from their Southern homes — it is then 
you may promise yourself a speedy realization 
of your fondest desires. You may promise your 
eyes, sights beautiful beyond description ; your 
ears, the welcome sounds and voices of the 
forest — bird-music, murmuring waters, sighing 
breezes ; your lungs, the wild mountain air ; your 
cheeks, a ruddy glow ; and above all these, the 
gentle art of Walton, you may practice from 
dewy morn till rosy eve. 

This is Sunday, and Monday morning seems 
a long way in the future, and the question up- 
permost in some of our minds, is whether we 
would be doing wrong by fishing on Sunday. 
Grey thinks we have no possible excuse for so 
doing. Gould does not believe fishing on that 
day is any more productive of evil than dawdling 



RANDOM CASTS. 23 



the time about the house reading old papers and 
novels, putting fishing tackle in order, smoking 
and yearning for Monday morning. Storm 
would not as a general thing fish on Sunday, 
nor remonstrate with one who did, and Senior 
told the following story : 

Once upon a time — as the fairy stories begin 
— four fishermen were sitting on the banks of a 
trout stream. The day was such an one as this, 
which cheers and gladdens the angler's heart ; 
but it was Sunday, and these four young men, 
being law abiding and Sabbath keeping, could 
not find it in their hearts to cast the fly nor drop 
the bait among the well stored ripples. After a 
long and animated discussion, the chief speaker 
drew from beneath his coat a rod and jointing it, 
held it over the water at the same time asking 
if there was any law prohibiting his holding that 
rod in such a position on Sunday. 

" No ! no ! certainly not ; '' the others replied. 
The second man drew form his pocket a line 
and fastening it to the end of the rod asked if 
there was anything detrimental to strict moral- 
ity in his so doing, 

" To be certainly not ; " was the answer. 



24 RANDOM CASTS. 



The third man drew forth a hook, inquiring ii 
his attaching- it to the end of the line was a pun- 
ishable offence. 

" No ! no ! no! v was the chorus and on went 
the hook. Young man, the fourth wished to 
know the opinions of his companions regarding 
the right and wrong of baiting that hook, and 
being assured that he was violating no com- 
mandment in simply fastening a worm on a 
hook, providing such worm had been dug the 
day previous and such being the date of its 
capture, on it went to the secret satisfaction oi 
all. 

The rod, line and hook were in complete fish- 
ing order and in the hand of the first young 
man, who then wished to learn the opinion of 
the party, in relation to a number of points, for 
they were very moral young men, were these 
four and would have scorned to go a'angling on 
the Sabbath day. He wished to know if it 
would be violating the eighth commandment 
should he move down the stream to a shady 
place by yonder rock and by merely dropping 
the point of the rod, allow the worm to sink a 
little beneath the water and protect the poor 



RANDOM CASTS. 



25 



thing from the heat of the sun. Of course any- 
thing so charitable as that, could not be wrong. 
There were a great many nice points decided as 
satisfactorily as these on shore, but the fishes 
below entertained different opinions and refused 
to bite, so not one rose to the surface. 

Fearing a repetition of the bad fortune attend- 
ing these moral young men who went fishing 
on Sunday, and the majority of us being or 
rather inclined to be conscientiously opposed to 
it, we returned a verdict of served 'em right, 
and postponed our fishing until the proper time. 

There should be no question as to the proper 
way of spending the Sabbath day. " You three 
big lusty fellows," says Senior, " have you noth- 
ing to be thankful for ? You Grey and Gould 
have health and strength and manly beauty, 
and seriously how often do you return thanks 
for them ? I beg pardon Grey, for tacking you 
and Gould together in that manner, for I know 
you are incapable of disobeying the command- 
ment which says : " Remember the Sabbath 
day to keep it holy." 

You Storm, have health and strength and al- 
though you do not handsome by the wholesale, 



26 RANDOM CASTS. 



you have more to be thankful for than you 
can repay. Stay at home and " think and 
thank." I know there is nothing in the whole 
wide world half so beautiful, as a well condition- 
ed trout, but were it a thousand times better 
and more beautiful, more beautiful and blessed 
is the Sabbath day's rest. If angling- is the 
u contemplative man's recreation,'' let this be a 
day of contemplation and spend it u without 
harm to your souls or interference with the 
rights and enjoyments of your fellow men.'' I 
do not propose to sling the concluding lines of 
Bryant's Thanatopsis at you, but please read 
them the first opportunity you have and then 
live up to them. 

Even if it proves to be a tame day, none of us 
will have the blues while Senior is present, for 
he is a man who never keeps down the devil of 
harmless and innocent fun, but lends him a help- 
ing hand, and the blue devil would find little 
about him to warrant a long tarry. Agreeable 
friends are blessings and he is one of the most 
attractive of those blessings, of cheerful temper, 
good humor, good sense, a prince among good 
fellows. A lover of nature finds much to love 



RANDOM CASTS. 2? 



in one as fond as himself of the woods and 
waters. There is a marvelous free-masonry in 
the forests, a mystical, indefinable sympathy, 
drawing- men mysteriously towards each other. 
Sympathy is a jewel, one of the pearls of life, 
and perhaps that is the secret of the mutual 
liking existing- between Senior and Storm, for, 
aside from their love of the woods there is no 
resemblance between them. 

With all of Senior's pleasantries the day to 
Gould seamed inordinately long. He had soon 
exhausted the scanty library and never did a 
man more want to discount the next few hours. 

" It's all right sonny. Take an old man's ad- 
vice about the Sabbath day and you'll make 
no mistake. If you think I am old fashioned 
and in my dotage, next Sunday you may have 
your own way and not a word will I utter in 
opposition, and then we'll see how you like it. 
This evening we'll go over the creek to Wilgus, 
and get him to back a load to the lake and help 
Giles around the camp. He used to be a de- 
cent sort of fellow if you kept whiskey away 
from him, and stood over him with a club. 
Naturally lazy, he will bear a great deal of 



28 RANDOM CASTS. 

watching and stands up under any amount of 
tongue lashing." 

" I do not see the sense of engaging such a 
man as that." 

"He will amuse you. His stupidity and 
lazyness will give employment to your cardinal 
virtues, which, I guess, are rather rusty." 

" Mr. Senior you have hitherto borne the 
reputation of being a level-headed man, but 
what can possess you to hire such a leather- 
headed old mummy as you say Wilgus is, beats 
my time." 

"I tell you, you will have some fun with him." 

4 ' He'll be the principal attraction in a funeral 
procession if he runs foul of me with any of his 
infernal nonsense." 

11 His barefaced lies will amuse you, and on 
that account you will shake hands with him and 
greet him as a brother." 

" Supposing I were to greet him as Cain 
greeted his brother Abel, would you not justify 
me ? At any rate, I do not purpose to have my 
sport interfered with by any whiskey drinking 
old fraud like your friend Mr. Wilgus. " 

After an early supper Senior and Storm called 
at Wilgus'. 



RANDOM CASTS. 29 

" Good evening Mrs. Wilgus, and how have 
you been this many a month since I last saw you." 

" Why, bless me, Mr. Senior, but you are good 
for my poor old eyes. I am very well, and you 
seem to be growing shorter and stouter and red- 
der year by year." 

u Oh ! that's from leading a quiet, regular life, 
temperate in every respect." 

" Well, Mr. Senior, regularity, in one's habits, 
goes far towards prolonging one's life and happi- 
ness, There's me and Wilgus for instance. We 
never have got along so smooth as during the 
last four years, since he commenced to be regu- 
lar in his habits." 

" Seems to me, Mrs. Wilgus, that John is get- 
ting very irregular in his habits, in his old age." 

'' Why, bless you, he has never been so regu- 
lar since we was man and wife." 

"He has a mighty queer way of showing it 
then." 

" 1 don't see anything irregular about him. 
You can depend on him as much as you can on 
the rising of the sun.'' 

" I saw him at Morehouseville, yesterday, and 
he did not look that way." 



30 RANDOM CASTS. 



" That's just where you make a mighty big 
mistake, young man, and don't forget it. He 
came home late last night, drunk as a lord, just as 

II expected he would, and that's the way always 
with him. A few years ago he would come 
home, sober most of the time, but occasionally 
a little off color. Finally he got so I could not 
tell how he would turn up, but now he is regu- 
lar as you could wish — regularly drunk you can 
depend on it, and that's what suits me, I always 
know how to find him." 

" Can you spare him for a few days and let 
him go up to the lakes with us ?" 

" Yes ; send Giles over for him early in the 
morning, and I'll have him fixed up. He ain't 
got back from the Ville yet, but he'll be around 
all right and don't whiskey him up too much 
when you get him in the woods. Keep him jest 
so, so." 



RANDOM CASTS. 3 1 



CHAPTER III. 

'* Blest silent groves, oh ! may you be 
For ever mirth's best nursery ! 

May pure contents 

For ever pitch their tents 
Upon these downs, these meads, these rocks, these 

mountains, 
And peace still slumber by these purling fountains ; 

Which we may every year 

Meet when we come a fishing here." 

Sir Henry Walton. 



"Just one more cast, I yet can see 

That miiler's white and dainty wing. 
Hold ! there he comes, strike quick and hard, 

Oh ! don't he make that leader sing. 
He's doubling on you, look out, sir ! 

He knows the game, just see him cut ! 
I'll risk my rod to save that trout, 

Stand by now, Frank, he's got the butt." 

Guides — Spruce Lake — Solitude — On A Raft — 
First Day's Fishing. 

JJAVING disposed of a hearty Monday morn- 
ing breakfast, to the merits of which we did 
ample justice, we re-arranged our baggage, put- 
ting it into carrying shape. We are going to 
Spruce Lake and Giles Becraft is our guide. 



32 RANDOM CASTS. 

Very fortunate is that person who has secured 
the services of a good guide, and his lump of 
gratitude must be undeveloped if he does not 
thank his lucky stars. The woods are swarming 
with men who call themselves guides, but few 
are deserving of the name. The first-class guides 
always designate those frauds who try to earn 
an odd penny, by claiming some knowledge of 
wood-craft, as farmers. 

They can chop wood, carry a moderately 
sized load, but as for performing any of the 
functions appertaining to wood-craft, one might 
as well engage the service of a tobacconist's 
sign. Their short comings in knowledge and 
experience they strive to neutralize by pretense 
and swagger. They will make any kind of state- 
ment and confirm it, by sticking to it, which, 
four times out of five is the only confirmation it 
ever receives. 

Giles is a genuine unadulterated back-woods- 
man, none better, few so good, and not like too 
many of his class who are as difficult of solution 



RANDOM CASTS. 33 



as one of Euclid's problems would be to the 
average Digger Indian. Guides usually have a 
dark mysterious look and manner, seldom 
vouchsafing any of their wood-craft to outside 
barbarians, as though telling north from west 
on a cloudy day, was an imposibility save to 
those born and educated in the forest, while the 
faculty of detecting intricate and hidden trails 
transcends the acquirements and capacities of 
ordinary mortals. From what few words they 
condescend to address to you, you must draw 
your own inferences, for seldom will they enter 
into details. 

Giles is not one of that class. All his knowl- 
edge is like himself, at your service. Not old 
in years, he is old in experience ; proficient in 
the use of the rifle, the rod and the paddle, so 
familiar with every trail through the woods that 
he never has to put on his spectacles, and what 
is better than all, he has none of the vices so 
prevalent among men and which in a great mea- 
sure accounts for his strength and activity. He 



34 RANDOM CASTS. 



is agile as a buck of the forest, tall, broad shoul- 
dered, ample chested, well muscled, easy temp- 
ered, good natured. 

The tramp before us to Spruce Lake is no easy 
one. Pedestrianism in the woods is awkward 
and floundering. Who can catalogue the almost 
inexhaustible variety of impediments that Na- 
ture has interposed to prevent comfortable loco- 
motion ? Every rod presents its specialty, and 
a mile would furnish a list appalling to the 
strength of any not a thorough devotee to the 
sport, offered after the difficulties in reaching it 
had been surmounted. Then the length of a 
mile according to the North Woods Guess 
Measure is 

14 inches make 1 foot. 

3 1 feet " 1 yard 

6 yards " 1 rod. 

400 rods " 1 mile. 

We fear that .the majority of American an- 
glers much prefer a well beaten track, even if it 
leads to waters too well fished to return them a 
Sfood dividend on their investment. Those 



RANDOM CASTS. 35 



who follow us will have to use their legs. A 
man who has an aversion to climbing and turn 
bling and torn clothes, never comes this way but 
once. He never passes his plate the second 
time for a day's tramp. 

Eight hours after leaving Becraft's, and about 
the middle of the afternoon, our packs are nn- 
slung at Spruce Lake, and a welcome we receive 
from birds, squirrels and rabbits, for we are old 
acquaintances of their parents, who have 
brought up their children to fear us not, as we 
think they are very pleasant to have running 
around the shanty, and none of us would harm 
a hair of their backs or a feather of their wings. 

The North Woods are full of beautiful lakes 
and ponds. Morehouse, Big Rock, Little Bear, 
Pine, G, have .many attractions surrounding 
them, but our idea of a beautiful lake is Spruce. 
Larger than the others, its surroundings, its 
shape, its conveniences render it the pleasantest 
and most enjoyable in this region. T t has the 
finest outlet of all ; not an abrupt tumbling over 



2,6 RANDOM CASTS. 



the shore, but a wide stream carrying its surplus 
waters away to the Canada Creek. 

The woods are never more than merely lone- 
some, for we hear the drumming of the part- 
ridge in the distance, the " who ! who ! who — 
who-o-o-o'' of the owl, the tapping of the 
woodpecker, the notes of the blue jay ; but it is 
by some stream or lake that one realizes, to the 
fullest, what is meant by solitude. The voices 
of the woods detract from the feeling of lone- 
someness, but by the lake those other voices and 
views, the quack of the ducks, the sight of a 
deer feeding in the lily-pads, the plash of an oar, 
and that sound, more suggestive than any other 
of utter loneliness, the shrill cry of the loon only 
serve to intensify the sense of solitude and make 
it more solid. Water adds to its solidity. 

If there was any way of transportation, this 
lake solitude might be cut into blocks, taken to 
the large cities and disposed of at remunerative 
prices, for no family especially where there were 
children would be without one ; what a blessing 



RANDOM CASTS. 37 



to the wearied down-town man who has been in 
a push, rattle and jam since morning- could he, 
when returning home in the evening, ensconce 
himself in his block of solitude. " There's mil- 
lions in it,'' for the man who will devise some 
method of getting it out of the woods. 
When Alexander Selkirk said ; 

" Oh ! solitude where are the charms, 
That sages have seen in thy face." 

He must have been gazing seaward. Alexander, 
however, had become surfeited. He had got 
too many oats for a shilling. His cup of soli- 
tude was full to overflowing, and doubtless he 
would have tolerated anything for a change. 

One very interesting feature about these lakes 
is the rafts. The tortoise has been quoted as 
an illustration of slow travelling ever since the 
days of Esop, but had the great fabler ever been 
made to work his passage on a raft, the tortoise 
would not have figured in his writings. The 
hands of a clock can be seen moving around 
the dial in obedience to the mechanism within. 



38 RANDOM CASTS. 



If your vision is very acute and your watching 
patient, you may see the corn growing, the 
hops slowly climbing up their poles, the flowers 
unfolding their beautiful petals, your boy grow- 
ing day by day, until his stature exceeds your 
own ; but how you can distinguish, appreciate, 
or be conscious that any raft you are poling or 
paddling is making headway, is a problem that 
our senses, wood-craft or water-craft, as yet 
fail to solve. 

The slang expression, " go slow old man and 
learn to paddle," was first spoken to a man on 
a raft. It was a speech totally unnecessary, 
for the poor man had no alternative but to go 
slow, and the fellow who delivered the insulting 
speech knew full well that if it were taken un- 
kindly, he could leisurely beat a retreat and be 
miles away before the man on the raft could 
effect a landing and chastise him for his inso- 
lence. " Hurry up," says Grey, while we are 
preparing our lines, flies, &c, " be out on the 
lake as soon as you can, for it smells trouty 



RANDOM CASTS. 39 



enough this afternoon and make a note of what 
I say, we will have all the trout we want to 
bring to the shanty this blessed night." 

In the east it was clear, a slight ripple was on 
the water, everything indicative of good sport 
among the fishes below and for the fishers 
above, and Grey conclusively demonstrated 
that he was a true prophet on this occcsion, 
when he promised us our baskets full of the 
speckled beauties. No long bearded Mussle- 
man could have placed more implicit faith in 
futurity than we, after hearing Grey so confi- 
dently predict such luck. 

The ripple on Spruce is always a favorable 
sign. Without a breath of air stirring, when 
the lake lies smooth as a mirror, it is folly to 
try and tempt a trout to seize the most decep- 
tive and carefully prepared fly. They will 
laugh at you just as surely as fish do laugh and 
call their fellows to witness your devices, and 
then bidding you good morning, hasten grace- 
fully away to their homes and there remain 
until they hear the breezes above. 



40 RANDOM CASTS. 



Jaded as we all were, we felt as though a 
trout supper we must have, so Senior and Gould, 
on our raft, poled across to the bay, where the 
Piseco trail strikes the lake, where they were ; 
to throw, and Grey with Storm on another raft 
poled towards the upper end of the lake, where 
the anchor was dropped just beyond reach of a 
large tree that had fallen into the water and 
made their first cast. Grey has selected a grizzly 
king, a grouse hackle and blue-winged coach- 
man, with which to allure the speckled swim- 
mers, and right well did he succeed ; the tempt- 
ing morsels were too great to be resisted. 

" So glistened the dire snake and into fraud 
Led Eve our credulous mother." 

No sooner had the flies gently touched the 
water than whiz-z-z sang the reel, the line 
grows longer and longer, the graceful bend of 
the rod its whole length, tells plainly as words, 
that some one of the myriads of trout that in- 
habit the lake, and one of more than ordinary 
size, had taken Monsieur fly between his jaws, 



RANDOM CASTS. 41 



and does not think the morsel improves on ac- 
quaintance, for his efforts to free himself are fran- 
tic in the extreme. A genuine desperado is this 
first martyr to our sleight of hand, but a strong 
line and rod in skillful hands, will ere long land 
you my beauty and over a blazing fire we will 
give to your bright spots a golden brown, and 
hungry men will pronounce you incomparable, 
but not you alone, for others of your kind will 
grace our homely table. 

Whenever Grey attempts to do anything it is 
done secundum artem, and this was no exception, 
for easily he played the trout, checking him 
gently in his " mad career," giving and taking 
until the fish resigned the unequal contest and 
surrendered, while a gleam of joy irradiated 
Grey's features as he deposited him in his 
basket. 

Storm's first cast was not rewarded. He 
tried a bright red fly, but it was too flashy to 
secure the admiration of any trout that day. 
They are whimsical creatures and like their 



42 RANDOM CASTS. 



food in season just as men like ice cream and 
sherry cobblers in July and hot whiskies in Jan- 
uary. Substituting flies like Grey's, pleased 
their dainty tastes, for soon Storm had his at- 
tention called to something smaller than a whale 
which was tugging away for dear life, trying 
his prettiest to rid himself of the sharp pointed 
steel he had so greedily taken. 

Come in out of the wet ; never more if my 
line don't part, will you glide through the 
bright waters, frightening the smaller fry and 
verdant chub that frolic in the shallow shore 
waters. Bigger chubs than they await your 
coming, smacking their lips in expectation of 
the treat you will afford. Your rich flavor will 
tickle our palates to-night, as we gather around 
our huge log-fire. 

Hallo! somebody else is knocking at the 
door. Well ! come in, we salute you, we are all 
at home this blessed day, ready to receive calls 
and visits from such as you. Please come in. Ex- 
cuse our slouched hats and heavy shoes. Do 



RANDOM CASTS. 43 

not judge us from outward appearances. Rough 
our exterior, but there are kind hearts beating 
beneath our wood-worn coats, and we will treat 
you kindly, for we love you best of all swim- 
ming things, and yours shall be a nice warm 
corner of the frying pan and our ears will listen 
with pleasure as you sing your last song with 
the cracking of burning logs about you. How 
you will writhe and twist dear fellow, how you 
will writhe and twist. Still another and another. 
They cannot be frightened away. Oh ! poor 
deluded creatures, how we pity. We are the 
spiders, 

"Will you walk into my parlor, 
Says the spider to the fly." 

But never more can you return to your old 
homes. The tracks to our creels are like those 
before the lions den, all pointed in, none out. 

Tempus never fugited faster than he did this 
afternoon, but he could not distance us, and ere 
the katydids commenced their evening songs, 
we had nearly filled our baskets and returned 
to the shanty. 



44 RANDOM CAS IS. 

In the frying pan was placed a portion of the 
afternoon's catch, and under the watchful eye 
and skillful hand of Giles, they underwent a 
complete metamorphosis, their spotted sides 
and graceful forms, changing to a golden brown 
and curling up as they hissed over the fire. 
Senior superintended the making of the coffee, 
hot, strong and plenty of it, while Gould and 
Grey set the table, a large piece of bark, and 
covered it with miscellaneous edibles. We had 
tin plates with us, but nice broad chips made 
better ones, obviated the necessity of washing, 
and when we were through with them, they 
made famous kindling wood. Everything is 
ready, help yourself. 

A smoke, a rubber of whist, and then wind- 
ing our blankets around us, we were soon sleep- 
ing and dreaming dreams that made the long 
night seem as bright and cheerful as the sun- 
shine of life. 



RANDOM CASTS. 45 



CHAPTER IV. 

"The wet leaves, the morning air 
Are stirring at its touch, and birds are singing 
As if to breathe were music ; and the grass 
Sends up its modest odor with the dew, 
Like the small tribute of humility. 
Lovely indeed is morning. I have drunk 
Its fragrance and its freshness, and have felt 
Its delicate touch ; and 'tis a kindlier thing 
Than music, or a feast, or medicine.' 



Willis. 



" Then I gently shake the tackle. 
Till the barbed and fatal hackle 
In its tempered jaws shall shackle 

That old trout, so wary grown. 
Now I strike him ! joy ecstatic ! 
Scouring runs ! leaps acrobatic. 
So I angle, 
So I dangle, 

All alone." 

Fitz. James O'Brien. 



Early Rising— A Contrary Wind— The True Angler— 
A Trout Fight — Wilgus 

-yyHEN Senior calls you in the morning you 
must rise ; there is no rolling the blankets 
closer around you and courting slumber, for 
his " pile out'' is a fiat from which there is no 
appeal, so we are up with the dawn- 



46 RANDOM CASTS. 



" Throw up the window ! 'tis a morn for life 

In its most subtle luxury. The air 

Is like a breathing from a rarer world 

And the south wind seems liquid — it o'ersteals 

My bosom and my brow so bathingly." 



' Early risers can best appreciate a charming 
day, for they alone behold its greatest beauties, 
the first blush of morn, when the golden gates 
of the East are unlocked, and woods, vallies and 
hills, little ribbons of streams, lakes and rivers, 
are all bathed in the light. Drink in the per- 
fumed air ; the slightly frosted air, burst your 
lungs with it if you can, bolt it down, it will 
cause sensations of delight, clear the head, 
lighten the heart, sharpen the eye, plant roses 
on your cheeks. It is the best cosmetic in the 
world. Open your windows, invite its early 
visits, and billow after billow will come surging 
in until the whole room is flooded with fresh- 
ness and fragrance, with inspiring whiffs and 
invigorating breezes. Be an early riser here if 
you are not when in the town. Never let the 
birds summon you from your slumbers more 
than once. Be up when they are, at the dawn 



RANDOM CASTS. 47 



of the day. Do not lose the best hours of the 
twenty-four in effeminate sloth, but be up if you 
love a charming day ere its loveliest and most 
charming part has disappeared. 

We all bear a hand towards preparing 
breakfast. Each has his duties assigned to him 
and the boss of the coffee pot has the most diffi- 
cult to perform if he does his task properly. 

JEolus, the king of the winds, eccentric as he 
sometimes is, has never had the reputation of 
being an inebriate, simply because those who 
know him best have sacredly kept their knowl- 
edge of his worst qualities from becoming a 
scandal to the gossiping world. But the truth 
must out. We know him in his gentle moods 
11 breathing o'er a bank of violets," carrying un- 
seen the fragrance of fruits and flowers. We 
have seen him dallying, like a lover, with the 
golden locks of sweet sixteen, and acting the 
good Samaritan to wearied three score years 
and ten. He fills the spreading canvas over 
thousands of busy decks and the whole world 
welcomes his quiet coming. 



4 8 RANDOM CAS1S. 

We know him in his angry moods, when he 
uproots the monarchs of the forests, when 
steeples, roofs and bridges are carried away as 
though they were paper toys. The ocean and 
great lakes he lashes until they are white with 
rage, and in their madness swallow up and de- 
stroy the wealth of nations and the lives of those 
we love. He is grand and mighty in his madness. 

That is his reputation with the world at 
large, but ask the man who has had to superin- 
tend the preparing of a meal in the forest, and 
he will tell you that if ever there was a disagree- 
able, drunken, dissolute, and detestable devil in 
the world it is Mr. Wind, especially around a 
camp-fire, during meal time. He is enough to 
drive a saint to the verge of profanity. 

You cannot get to windward of him, you are 
always in his teeth and he is incessantly blind- 
ing you with smoke. He is ubiquitous. We 
know whereof we speaketh. He has followed 
us in the most provoking manner, changing his 
direction for the most unaccountable reasons, in 



RANDOM CASTS. 49 



fact, for no reason whatever but to be drunken- 
ly mean and disagreeable. He combines the 
treachery of a Sioux with the persistency and 
perversity of an empty musquito. That is the 
plain English of it. That is a true picture of 
him as he exists, in a place where of all places 
in the world, he should be a decent fellow and 
treat his visitors with at least a suspicion of 
consideration. But that is hardly to be ex- 
pected at this late day. He is beyond redemp- 
tion and if, when you are boiling your coffee or 
frying your trout, he cuts up his capers, as he 
undoubtedly will, you may indulge in justifiable 
growls, and if you have an absurd prejudice 
against profanity, cast it aside, just this once, no 
more, and wax eloquent in denunciation of the 
fiend wind and the demon smoke. 

After breakfast we paired of, as on the previ- 
ous day, and all started towards Balsam Lake 
outlet, on the east side of Spruce Lake, buoyant 
with hope, joyous and expectant as school-boys 
with an extra holiday. One can enjoy the an- 



5<D RANDOM CASTS. 



ticipation of pleasure with almost as keen a 
relish as he does the participation. Hope, that 
blind Fortune will favor, is one of the secrets 
which appertain to the sportsman's recreation, 
• f be he armed with rod or gun, and Senior 
pinned his faith on his experience of previous 
mornings like this. There is a great deal of 
speculation in it, but speculation is a Yankee 
characteristic and he comes honestly by it. His 
auguries were not false. 

Full in our face was blowing a gentle breeze 
laden with no blinding smoke, but one of exquisite 
freshness, not eager, just strong enough " to blow 
a lady's curl aside," a promising morning, it was 
fairly burdened with favorable signs. 

" I'll forfeit my credit," said Senior, in the art 
prognostic, " although I am not the seventh 
daughter of a seventh daughter, that mine is the 
largest fish to-day. 

Says Frank Forester, " the man who fishes for 
the fish and not for the fishing, is not a true sports- 
man/' and when we cast our flies on the water 



RANDOM CASTS. 5 I 



it was not the size and value of the fish that 
prompted the casts, but the sport of playing and 
drowning them in their natural element. We 
would sooner have a half-hour's struggle with 
one that fights well for its life, and at last dies 
gamely or even escapes, than to catch a dozen, 
in half the time, if they could be landed without 
an effort. 

It is not the number of fish he captures that 
makes the angler contented, for the true angler 
can enjoy the mere throwing of the fly if he has 
only an occasional fish to reward his efforts He 
is no profane glutton damning every fish in the 
water unless they take hold. He is conversant 
with their whims and good naturedly humors 
them. There is something besides catching fish 
to call him to the woods and waters. Henry 
Walton said of angling : u it was a rest to his 
mind, a cheerer of his spirits, diverter of sadness, 
a calmer of unquiet thoughts, a moderator of 
passions, a procurer of contentedness.'' 



52 RANDOM CASTS. 

There's a trout taken your stretcher and he's 
going" away with it. Steady now ! How your 
eyes sparkle Mr. Storm ; beaming with faith 
and hope. You're giad enough it's going 
and it's coming back again if you are only 
yourself and don't allow your temper to be 
ruffled nor a nerve shaken. Don't be rash nor 
boyish, which too often looses the game by first 
loosing control of yourself. The excitement 
makes your heart beat as wildly as a girl's upon 
her wedding morning. Don't get excited, I tell 
you ! better go home and die like a stupid block- 
head. Don't swear, for, says good Isaak Wal- 
ton: "swear not angler, or you'll frighten the 
fish.'' Give him a little more play-room, for ha 
insists upon having it. Now don't be in too great 
haste, there's time enough. Many and many 
objects easy of attainment are failures from the 
clumsiness of haste and anxiety. Don't let your- 
self think you are " standing on the ragged edge 
despair." Bear in mind the old adage " The 
more haste the more waste,'' and take your 



RANDOM CASTS. 53 

time if it is all day. There he goes again. 
Now a steady hand for that's the keystone to 
success. 

If ever a trout thought, that trout was think- 
ing, concocting some mischief. Finally he mov- 
ed slowly towards and underneath the raft, bend- 
ing the rod fairly double in his efforts to break 
it, but it was one of Buckingham's best and 
nothing save a suddon jerk could break it, and 
the man at the butt end of it was watching care- 
fully that nothing under the category of jerks 
should occur. 

A trout has a genius for strategy. He is one 
of those fellows that find out things in which 
they are particularly interested in a very brief 
space of time, and this one concluded right 
speedily, that no steady pull was going to di- 
vide the line or splinter the rod, and accordingly 
he changed his tactics, and broke to the surface, 
his handsome sides and richer than golden belly 
shining among the sparkling drops of the tiny 
shower he caused as he came upward with a 



54 RANDOM CASTS. 



mighty rush, and again he came and again, each 
rush as frantic as the first, for full well he knew 
that " desperate diseases by desperate remedies 
are cured or not at all," and his remedies were 
the very embodiment of recklessness and despair. 
Suddenly he adopted a new artifice to achieve 
his exemption from the frying-pan, and away he 
started for the opposite shore, making the reel 
buzz as the line lengthened yard after yard, 
but a pull, strong as the fine line would bear, 
deadened the force of his headlong rush, and 
back he suffered himself to be led by the nose ; 
but not yet a prisoner as he was still alive though 
somewhat discouraged. His silent submission 
was only a new ruse to throw his would be 
captor off his guard, for while Storm was quietly 
reeling him in he shot forward so rapidly that 
the rod had to be carried away over the shoulder 
to prevent any slack in the line, and the brilliant 
beauty appreciating the condition of affairs made 
his final effort by jumping out of the water 
again ; but he was so promptly and carefully 



RANDOM CASTS. 



55 



met that he abandoned the struggle and uncon- 
ditionally surrendered. 

He was stuck as fast to the hook as sin has 
stuck to the human family ever since Eve was 
tempted in the garden. Its fierce paroxysms 
availed nothing for 

" Fixed to the teeth by that tough shining bait, 
He struggling yields to suicidal fate." 

Well, well, caught at last old fellow ! dead to 
all intents and purposes, dead as the mummies 
of Egypt embalmed thousands of years ago. 

Could you see the smile of triumph playing 
over the features of Storm, the eyes sparkling 
with exultation, the cheeks flushed with pleasure, 
you would never have thought his was naturally 
a cold distant looking face though no true index 
of the inner man. 

While Storm was landing this fish the others 
had not been idle, for some beautiful trout, rang- 
ing from a half to two pounds, were thrashing 
helplessly in the baskets. 



56 RANDOM CASTS. 



Wilgus after trying to help Giles around the 
shanty, and proving himself more of an encum- 
brance than an assistant, was gladly dismissed 
by Giles and told to get aboard a raft and try 
to catch a few fish. Wilgus made the attempt, 
but at his first anchorage fell asleep, and re- 
mained so until Giles finally paddled out for him, 
brought him ashore, and set him to chopping 
wood. 

Wilgus was decidedly lazy or perhaps consti- 
tutionally tired. He always insisted that he 
was born tired, and inherited his laziness. He 
claimed that his father was the old man who 
threw himself beneath a tree one hot summer's 
day and said u there, damn you, breathe if you 
want to, I shant.'' 

He was immensely enamored with hard 
work. Long he loved to sprawl and contem- 
plate it with a wink and a blink, and to prove 
he was not afraid of it he would lie down beside 
it like Mrs. Jones' fat boy, and go to sleep and 
dream pleasant dreams. 



RANDOM CASTS. 57 



He may have been perfectly justified in his 
laziness, for it was work, hard work too, to carry 
such feet as his. They were awful in their im- 
mensity, and a pair of boots fitted to be easy on 
his bunions were immense in their awfulness. 
He was originally from Rhode Island, and his 
reasons for coming here were obvious. He 
wanted room to turn around in without stepping 
into Massachusetts or Connecticut. He pre- 
ferred citizenship in a State where there was 
more land to the acre. He never intentionally 
stepped on a man's corns, but he was always 
putting somebody's foot in pain. That was in 
Rhode Island, but here in the North Woods he 
could sling his feet pretty much as he pleased 
and harm nobody. 

With digestive organs unimpaired, and a 
mouth which was put on hot and had run all 
over his face, he was in perfect accord with 
Sancho Panza in that both believed eating and 
sleeping to be the greatest of human inventions. 



58 RANDOM CASTS. 



CHAPTER V. 



Phys. — " Auche Io sou Pescatore — I too am 
a fisherman — a triumph." 

Sir Humphrey Davy. 



" 'T is delightful the trout to ensnare, 
To gaze on his sports, like the cheek of the fair 
And sigh when their brilliancy sinks in decay, 
As bright as the rainbow, yet fleet as its ray." 

Anon. 



First Things— My First Trout— A Leaky Shanty — 

WlLGUS AND THE PANTHER. 



g^IX men with appetites keen as Damascus 
razors need a more than ordinary supper to 
satisfy their cravings, and thanks, we have the 
wherewithal to supply ourselves. The coffee was 
delightfully hot, the water deliciously cool, the 
trout in their golden coats looked tempting 
enough for an epicure, so 

" Down we sat 
And to our viands fell, not seemingly, 
But with the keen dispatch of real hunger," 

and we were soon playing knife and fork as in- 
dustriously as we had done rod and line during 
the afternoon. 



RANDOM CASTS. 59 



Our afternoon's sport had been thoroughly 
satisfactory. None of us could complain, while 
to Gould it was a real red-letter day in his life. 
He had abducted his fair quota of the day's catch, 
and was almost in a transport of joy over his 
good fortune, particularly admiring and holding 
up to our gaze, one glorious black-backed, red- 
bellied fellow, the first trout he had ever caught. 
Gould was tickled enough, and would hardly 
have cared had he caught no more during our 
stav. We humor him in his enthusiasm. He 
will never again capture his first trout. He 
may catch larger trout, but never one that will 
make his nerves tingle and his heart beat so fast ; 
and though he lives beyond the allotted years of 
man, through all those years he may often recall 
the sweetest memories of men and things, his 
heart will tell him, that save a mother's holy love 
the sunniest imprint there is this day's pleasure. 
No success in after life, however brilliant it may 
be, can efface the memory of it. 



60 RANDOM CASTS. 



First things usually effect us in a manner I 
peculiarly their own. 

Do you remember the first pair of trousers 
your little legs dove into ? Wasn't that a pleas- 
ant proud time with you? How proudly you 
strutted around like a turkey gobbler with that 
same pair of trousers rolled up to display the 
red morocco tops of your first pair of boots. 
Well do I remember the boyish delight I exper- 
ienced when I ran to exhibit my new clothes to 
a little girl neighbor. It was soon an old story. 
Donning them every day the novelty wore away 
and sliding down cellar doors and down the 
roof of the old engine house, soon wore away 
the trousers. 

Next came the first cigar with a pleasant sen- 
sation, produced thereby, until the middle of the 
weed commenced to burn ; then came the par- 
tial choking, a few tears, a shudder, a gradual 
unconsciousness, succeeded by a sinking sensa- 
tion in the region of the stomach, immediately 
followed by a rising ditto far from pleasant. 



RANDOM CASTS. 



Every good boy has willingly though stealthily, 
suffered the same disorder. The first cigar how- 
ever is seldom the last. 

Then comes in my experience the first kiss 
outside of and unknown to my family. Do not 
mention it for it nearly frightened me to death, 
but I recovered, and am not a particle afraid of 
them nowadays. Then I escorted a little girl 
home and thought myself a little man. My first 
whipping I do not remember, as it must have 
taken place at a very early stage of my existence, 
although the recollections of many inflicted after- 
wards by parents, teachers, and occasionally by 
playmates, are as distinctly impressed upon my 
mind as the cutting, stinging hits were imprinted 
upon my body. I was considered a bad boy 
and received many chastisements. 

The first trout I ever hooked was at Wilmurt 
Lake, many years ago. Will Morgan, companion 
since in many a trip to the woods, was in the 
boat with me, and had been instructing me in 
the modus operandi of handling a large fish in case 



62 RANDOM CASTS. 



I hooked one, and listening- to him I had be- 
come the least mite nervous. With feelings 
not at all compassion, I slung the baited hook 
into the water and presently something walked 
away with it and a portion of the line while a 
shout of derisive laughter greeted my ears, thus 
adding insult to injury. 

" O ' what a tangled web we weave. 
When first we practice to deceive/' 

I thought the English language lacking in 
words strong enough to condemn the lack of 
sympathy evinced. There was no need of pro- 
fanity. I did not feel able to do the thing justice, 
and so I kept a close seal on my lips while an 
almost overpowering melancholy came stealing 
over me. 

" Be calm, my Delius and serene, 
However fortune change the scene 
In thy roost dejected state 
Sink not underneath the weight j" 

And when the mischief had been repaired, I 
dashed away the gloom of ill fortune and boldly 
said 

" I am not sick if Brutus has in hand, 
An exploit worthy the name of man,'' 



RANDOM CASTS. 63 



And at the next venture, quickly mastering the 
faults of inexperience, I was (i born to good 
luck." How triumphant I felt that moment, and 
.for many after, when that speckled beauty, that 
'golden glory oi the water, prince among swim- 
ming things, was thrashing helplessly in the bot- 
tom of the boat. The dove returning to Noah, 
with the olive branch, was not more welcome, 

With all the manifold pleasures to be derived 
from a season in the camp, there are many an- 
noyances to be encountered. " The equity of 
Providence has balanced peculiar sufferings with 
peculiar enjoyments,'' and the inverse holds good. 
Yet in a summer's retreat one ordinarily endeav- 
ors to derive as much comfort as possible with 
the least outlay, and if you are not well up in 
camp life, and sometime intend giving it a trial, 
perhaps we can aid you in steering clear of one 
or two natural discomforts attending it, and like 
Abou Ben Adhem ask you to 

" Write me as one that loves his fellow men,' 



64 RANDOM CASTS. 



Not a cloud to be seen, the great fat moon at 
its fullest, the stars brightly twinkling, the voices 
of the night and the sighing breezes lulling you 
to the sleep, you have richly earned by a day's 
sport, that some would call hard work. What- 
ever name is given it, you desire your undis- 
turbed night's rest, and as you roll, your blankets 
around you, taking a last look at the cheerful 
fire, )'ou are almost tempted to say that the dis- 
couragements and annoyances ot the day, if 
there have been any, were only to pave the way 
for balmy sleep, but you do not say it, you are 
asleep too soon. 

Out-stretched on a bed of hemlock-boughs, 
your feet comfortably warm by the big fire, 
dreams if you are a dreamer should be pleasant, 
snores if you are a snorer should awaken the 
echoes of the hills, and the early morning should 
find you up refreshed, reinvigorated, and ready 
lor another day's sport or hard work. But pen 
haps you have been lying with your back across 
a stick or an old root, hidden under your bed of 



RANDOM CASTS. 65 



boughs, and you are so stiff and sore you can 
scarcely move when you awake, though a few 
minutes will drive the soreness away. It is a mere 
trifle, but you had better look carefully to the 
bottom of the shanty and remedy its little faults 
in time. 

There is another discovery that is almost in- 
variably made too late. The shanty leaks. This 
discovery is usually made about midnight and 
during a heavy shower You turned in leaving 
the moon and stars shining, wind the wrong direc- 
tion for rain, but during the night it has shifted 
and your first knowledge of it comes when pat- 
ter, patter, patter, fail the drops into your ear, 
spoiling perhaps some sweet dream of a darling 
you have left at home You turn over only to 
meet your neighbor rolling your way to avoid a 
little stream that has been incommoding him, 
You pull your blankets over your head and find 
that they have already absorbed enough moisture 
to render them uncomfortable. It is only half-past 
twelve, the fire is out, the rain is coming faster 



66 RANDOM CASTS. 



and faster. You manage to worry through 
until the beautiful sunrise of the morning puts 
an end to your miserable waiting. What a 
mockery is the golden light of daybreak to you 
after enduring the horrors of a sleepless night. 
It seems to say : " Good morning how'd you 
rest last night? Well, I hope. Looks like a 
pleasant day." 

Patching your shanty and deluding yourself 
with the idea that it is water tight may be satis- 
factory and it is a good idea to enjoy until 
actual experience stalks in and you get wet. 
See to it that your shanty is secure and tight as 
possible and then take your chances and win or 
loose do not grumble and chalk up one against 
your vacation. It is only an episode of the 
glorious life in the woods, 

Around the evening fire Wilgus rather mon- 
opolized the conversation and we conceded his 
claim. The chief characteristic^ distinguishing 
him next to his laziness aad love of whiskey, was 
a most decided tendancy to extravagance in 



RANDOM CASTS. 67 



every statement he made. The most matter of 
fact and every day occurrence concerning- him- 
self, assumed almost heroic proportions as he 
related them, but if one took the trouble to in- 
vestigate, he would invariable find their size and 
importance dwindle away to less than inappreci- 
able mediocrity.. 

u So boys," he would say, " you didn't have 
fuss rate luck yesterday. Well, I purpose 
having a hack at 'em myself in the morning, and 
when me and my old bamboo git to work, why 
the matter is, there is always some fresh meat 
in camp. Just all you want to eat and lots to 
give away. I tell you boys, I'll lift the fins 
certain." 

" My habits, I'll admit, aint never been of the 
best, yet I never seed but one sick spell in my 
life, and that was right after my killing the big 
panther on Burnt Pint." 

" Why, Wilgus, I never heard of your killing 
a panther.'' 



68 RANDOM CASTS. 



u You might have heard on it if 3 7 ou had lived 
up in these parts. They can all tell you about 
it up here." 

" Give us the story about your exploit." 
" Me and Hen Paygan was out arter a bear, 
and had been running purty much all over the 
deestrick hereabouts and struck Burnt Pint. 
You can see the place as you drive over Hog's 
Back, the other side of Bethune, coming this 
way. We was on the Pint, about four or 
thereabouts, in the afternoon, and Hen spied a 
panther just getting into its den, and Hen's fust 
thought was to git up and git the other way. 
3 Hold on Hen,' says I, 'let's git Mr. Panther.' 
'Dang Mr. Panther,' says Hen, 'he'll git us.' 'Not 
much, Mary Ann,' says I. Says Hen, ' you can 
have him Mr. Wilgus, I don't want him.' ' I 
want him,' says I, 'and want you to help git him. 
'I aint helping so much as I was,' says he. 'Iaint 
leaving this place without that panther,' says 1. 
'All right, I am,' says he. ' Go on then,' says I, 
and Hen left me like the durned coward as he 






RANDOM CASTS. 69 

was. Well, Mr. Panther, you are my meat cer- 
tain, thinks I as I looked over my rifle to see that 
it was all rig-lit. I didn't have no knife or I 
would have went into the cave without the rifle 
and come to close quarters. I crawled in, on 
my hands and knees, about twenty feet, made a 
turn to the right and there was the cave high 
enough to stand up in. It was dark as night 
and darker. Nothing to be seen, but over in 
the other end of it, a pair of eyes shining which 
was all I had to guide me. Up came my rifle 
just as the panther seemed to spring towards 
me. Bang and the panther dropped dead at my 
feet. I didn't know where I had hit him till I 
dragged him out after a hard tug and then found 
the bullet had struck plumb betwixt the eyes. 
Well, I got help, borrowed a knife and skinned 
the cuss that night and you can see the hide at 
my house any time. That night, while think- 
ing on my adventure, it finally struck me as 
being rather a skeery place to put a man in, and 
dang me, if I didn't begin to grow skeert and in 



RANDOM CASTS. 



five minutes I was all in a tremble, till the old 
woman says : ' Hallo, Wilgus, you have been 
histing some more to-day.' Nary a drop,' says I, 
and then I was too faint to say more. The old 
woman got me into bed and there I laid a month 
before I was fairly myself again. You see a man 
like me never weakens when there is anything 
like that to do. After its all over then comes 
the skeer if ever. That's the only time I was 
ever sick with all my knocking round.'' 

" Wilgus,'* says Grey,, s: you are the most in- 
fernal old liar I ever heard talk. I have heard 
that story of the panther before. It was one of 
the Becraft boys that killed it, and how you can 
sit there and claim the credit of it passes my 
comprehension." 

" That's all right, Mr. Grey, I was only telling 
you how I would have done and how it would 
have effected me i( I had been there.'' 

" Yes, you would have left with Hen Pay- 
gan, or never been here lying like a dog." 

" I guess I'll average as much truth as any 
one in these parts." 



RANDOM CASTS. 71 



" That depends. From your last yarn I 
should say truth with you is very accommodat- 
ing and keeps out of the way.'' 

" Do you mean to say I don't care for the 
truth?" 

" I don't believe you ' hanker arter it ' The 
old saying is, truth lies at the bottom of a well, 
and I think you must have thrown you portion 
into the bottomless pit and have never been 
able to fish it out again, even if you have made 
the attempt, which I very much doubt" 

" You never yet caught me in a single lie." 

" No, you bet your life I never did. Your lies 
are not single. They are all married and have 
large families." 



72 RANDOM CASTS. 



CHAPTER VI. 



" From our gleaming pile of pounders, we chose the larger 
and the smaller for appropriate experiments. Then we tested 
our experiments ; we tasted our examples. Success. And 
success in science proves knowledge and skill. We feasted. 
The delicacy of our food made each feaster a nner essence.''" 

Theodore Winthrop. 



"There is a tiny weed, man, 

That grows far o'er the sea, man 
The juice of which doth more bewitch 

Than does the gossip's tea, man, 
It's name is called tobacco ; 

'Tis used near and far> man, 
The carman chews — but I will choose 

The dantier cigar man." 



In the Woods — Pleasant Companions — A Summer's 
Nooning — A Pipe of Tobacco. 



ifP again with the first faint blushes of morning-. 
That's the time to strike 'em. Ripe fruit 
wont wait you know. The trout enjoy an 
early breakfast, for they are sober creatures and 
need no matutinal cocktail to create a fictitious 
appetite. They go to bed early, have no lodges 
to attend, no cars off the track, nor ferry boats 
aground, no man down town to see on " busi- 
ness/' nor any of the thousand and one ailments 



RANDOM CASTS. 73 



benedicts are prone to manufacture to allay the 
incredulity of their too exacting spouses. 

Time speeds away unheeded. Our shadows 
on the water told us it was near noon, so pad- 
dling our rafts to the shore, we landed and pre- 
pared our mid-day meal. A large log served 
for a table, for such as chose to put on city airs 
and style, while clean white chips answered the 
double purpose of plates and tables for the more 
modest. Fresh from the water, and before the 
rich colors begin to lose their lustre, is the time 
to eat our trout at their best. As no epicure 
cares for clam chowder except on the seacost 
or where he can get a whiff of salt air to give 
the proper relish to the bivalves, as the circus 
is the place of places for munching peanuts, so 
the camp fire is the place of all places in which 
to get just the turn to your game. The trout 
hissed upon the dishes in the most appetizing 
manner, and right speedily were we eulogizing 
the merits of some of them which Giles had 



74 RANDOM CASTS 



carefully dressed, salted, buttered and broiled , 
and a more delicious morsel never passed the 
portals to one's stomach, " We take and enjoy 
OLir share and say a Benediction for the whole." 

1 his is solid sport and comfort replete withal- 
most endless charms awakening the happiest emo- 
tions. Life here is no dull monotonous current, 
no calm level where one has to practice a false 
contentment. There is enough to do for willing 
hands, pleasant sounds and voices in the forest, 
on the river by the lake for those who can hear, 
plenty to see for such as have eyes and know 
how to use them, though there be folks who 
" can travel from Dan to Beersheba and say : 
1 'Tis all barren and ' so it is and so is all the 
world to him who will not cultivate the fruits 
it offers." 

Of all pleasures I have ever experienced, none 
can equal this with a few chosen friends, a brisk 
walk up and down the mountain sides, a pull on 
the lake, a plunge into the crystal water, a hearty 
dinner and a noon day nap under the shade of 



RANDOM CASTS. 75 



wide spreading trees, cheered by the smiles and 
beauties of Nature, dreaming fanciful day 
dreams, watching the silvery ripples on lake and 
stream, listening to the whispering of leaves, to 
the laughing of waters, to the birds singing 
mingled and multiplied songs without words, 
and trilling love notes in the fullness of their joy. 

" Happy the man who has the town escaped 

To him the whispering trees, the murmuring brooks, 

The shining pebbles preach 

Virtues' and wisdoms' love." 

To those who love society but not crowds for 
pleasure, we say go wander over mountains and 
move through field and forest, where you need 
not trouble yourself about folly and fashion, 
where you can kick off the shackles of conven- 
tionalism, where there is no fancied superiority of 
one class over another, but where all honest and 
and pleasant people are " hale fellows well 
met," and mind you, there is no place so good, 
to study character, to learn the disposition, to 
detect the good and bad qualities of companions, 
for successfully disguising yourself is simply 



j6 RANDOM CASTS. 



impossible. You will show your heart uncon- \ 
sciously perhaps, but surely be it in your favor ,3 
or against. ) 

It was not so very strange that after our \ 
lunch we drew from our pockets pipes and to- J 
bacco and were soon enjoying the pleasures ; 
they yielded and rioting in the charms of a per- 
fect summer's day. ] 

From amid the delicate foliage in the green 
recesses of the hills, beside the clear mountain 
streams, in shadowed dells and in the mid-day 
sun on towering pinnacles, the forest songsters 
warbled their sweet improvisitations. The 
lake like a huge mirror trimmed with ever- 
greens, ripples into mimic waves and beats 
against the shore like a slackened pulse. The 
birch trees with their silvery bark and leaves, 

" Most beautiful of forest trees 
The lady of the woods." 

Grows side by side with the towering hemlock 
as if seeking its protection. The spruce inter- 
twines its dark green branches among the 






RANDOM CASTS. JJ 



strong rough arms of the giant elms. Balsam 
and pine whisper soft nothings to the maple and 
the beech ; the white ash and the black held 
sweet converse, one with the other, and over 
all the glorious sun sheds his rays and throws 
around them his bands of golden light. The 
whole world is harmonious in our eyes. This 
place is too beautiful for anything poor, mean 
or insignificant. 

If " a pleasant day is the smile of God upon 
the deeds of good men,'' this world is not all 
wicked — there must be good in it, and men and 
women are to-day performing good deeds in 
His name and He is smiling upon them and 
adding jewels to the crowns they are to wear in 
the better land. 

Long we sat and gazed upon the lovely scene 
that surrounded us, listened to the bird music, 
let the breath of heaven fan our cheeks and 
thought perhaps of our own littleness as we 
looked upon the great ocean of verdure rolling 
mountains high. . • • - ■ • 



78 RANDOM CASTS. 



An hour before dark we were again casting 
our flies on the ripples. When we gathered up 
our lines we had a fair exhibit of the speckled 
beauties. And now for another smoke before 
retiring. Among a party of anglers did ever 
one fail to notice immediately after a hearty 
meal how soon all were blowing blue clouds of 
fragrant smoke from pipes of every discription, 
briar-wood and meerschaum, bog-oak, laurel 
root and corn-cob, some crooked with graceful 
swan neck curves to the stems, some short and 
straight like an Irishman's clay. Very seldom 
is a cigar seen. The cigarette from far off 
Russia, the imported Regalia, the native Rap- 
pahannock, the adulterated Stinkarora find no 
abiding place in the forest camp. The pipe as the 
smoker's luxury reigns supreme. A little plank- 
road stock whittled from the solid plug and rub- 
bed in the palms of your hand until it has attained 
the desired fineness and then sprinkled with a 
pinch of Vanity Fair, a lays over'' all the deft 
roiling of the weed by either home or foreign 



RANDOM CASTS. 79 



workmen. Once lit and well agoing, a pipe of 
plug furnishes an afternoon's smoke cool and 
lasting. It has not the tongue blistering and 
throat parching qualities of the mild light weed 
that comes in paper packages and cotton bags. 

It is the fashion to preach against smoking, its 
opponents arguing that it is injurious to the 
health, while it is injurious only when indulged in 
to excess, and so is drinking the purest, clearest 
spring water, or eating the best cooked meats and 
vegetables. It makes one nervous they errone- 
ously state, while the truth is, there is nothing 
known to the medical profession more soothing 
than a pipe full of good tobacco, unless it be 
two or three pipesfull, and hardly any class of 
people smoke more than medical students and 
full fledged M. Ds. The pipe has worked no 
more mischief than the tea and coffee pot. Go 
ask your doctor if it has. It helps digestion, 
and of all my acquaintances and companions in 
the woods 1 have found, without an exception, 
that the moderate smokers invariably endure 



So RANDOM CASTS. 

fatigue, intense heat and extreme cold better 
than those who do not use the vile ? weed. 

It predisposes the mind to philosophic thought. 
" He who smokes much thinks like a philoso- 
pher," The Mohammedan everywhere cherish 
and prize it above all other luxuries they enjoy ; 
the Tartar believes that tobacco smoke clears 
the head, strengthens the sight, brightens the 
mind. In the wigwam of the Indian its fumes 
arise with the smoke of their council fires. The 
grizzly bearded worker among the mines of 
Colorado, California and Australia, the rough 
lumberman in the forest of Maine, the blue 
shirted tars who ride the waves of the Atlantic 
and Pacific, the soldier in camp and field will 
all tell you that tobacco is the other staff of life. 

It will make a stupid man brilliant and talka- 
tive, developing his conversational powers so 
every one should acquire the art of smoking as 
of all arts it is the most social. If you are in- 
dolent, a cigar or pipe will exite and prove an 
incentive to action ; if you are weary it will 
rest and refresh you. 



RANDOM CASTS. 8 1 



Shortens life ? well, perhaps it does. We will 
allow five years to be deducted from the life of 
a smoker, for every smoker will be satisfied to 
give that time, liberal as it is, for the privilege 
of smoking, while he does live. Old age ! We 
once knew an old store keeper, as they are called 
in the country, who was never blessed with a 
rush of customers, consequently, he passed the 
greater portion of his time, between the calls 
for half a pound of sugar and a yard of sheeting, 
smoking his clay pipe. He had saved during 
his long life a very respectable property, and 
his children, men and women grown, seeing 
there was no probability of his shuffling off, 
were secretly wishing him " to that bourne 
from which &c, &c," but of course did not wish 
to cut his throat, poison him, or shoot him, so 
two of the brothers, after learning in some man- 
ner how the old gentleman was intending to 
dispose of his property, agreed that the cheap- 
est and least criminal way to kill off pater famil- 
ias, was to reduce his rations of tobacco, and by 



82 RANDOM CASTS. 



mixing powder with it, stealing it, breaking 
his pipes, or plugging up their stems so aggra- 
vated and troubled their dear old father, that 
he began to lose flesh and confidence in the 
weed, for never could he fill up a pipe without 
something being at fault. So completely de- 
moralized and nervous did he become, that in 
two months from the opening of active hostili- 
ties he was beneath the sod. That was twenty- 
five or thirty years ago, and he died a very old 
man ; whereas had his smoking not been inter- 
fered with, he might still be living, too old to 
die and all from being a confirmed lover of the 
weed. 

Pass that pouch this way Gould, please, for 
that yarn sounds tough, but it is true as tough, 
for during some little household jar or domestic 
unpleasantness, one of the brothers " gave it 
away." And learning to smoke, is it not a test 
of gameness, perseverance, industry and other 
cardinal virtues, with a reward in the shape of 
pleasures, unimaginable to the uninitiated, plea- 



RANDOM CASTS. 83 



sures not to be described, but to be enjoyed by 
those who have survived the horrors of the first 
boyish attempt. 

4i Fudge." If you are not a smoker, perhaps 
it is better, but I will smoke my pipe as a lady 
sips her chocolate, slowly and fondly, carefully 
blowing the smoke in a thousand fairy fantastic 
forms, for I love it and love to sit among the 
curling clouds as they wreath themselves around 
my neck, which they touch more gently and 
softer than could a lady's arm. Now, now, care- 
fully old fellow, stop your nonsense and fill up 
once more with the strong seductive Turkish ; 
fill up 

" The pipe which is so lily white, 
In which so many take delight." 

A few more delicate bluey rings we'll puff and 
say good night. 



84 RANDOM CASTS. 



CHAPTER VI 



" And through its midst there ran a crystal flood 
With many a murmuring song and elfin shout, 
In whose clear pools the crimson spotted trout 
Would turn his tawny side to sun and sky, 
Or sparkling upwards catch the summer fly." 

The Palace Garden. 



" Oh 'tis sweet to feel the plastic 
Rod, with top and butt elastic 
Shoot the line in coils fantastic 
Till, like thistle down, the fly 
L'ghtly falls upon the water, 
Thirsting for the finny slaughter. 

As I angle 

And I dangle 

Mute and sly." 

Fitz. James O'Brien. 



Jessups River — Wet Feet and Tight Boots — Creek 
Fishing — Losing a Trout — Suicide. 



"VVTHEN the morning broke, it was with a hazy 
misty appearance as if undecided whether to 
keep its sunshine for some other day and send 
us a heavy shower, or whether to lighten up 
and disperse the sun's rays broadcast, but it soon 
befriended us, for the fresh wind scattered the 



RANDOM CASTS. 85 

morning- vapors and rolled away the sluggish 
clouds which had hung over us like a cold 
shroud. 

Alter breakfast, while taking our top o' the 
morning smoke, we con over arrangements for 
the day and as a sequel to a rather animated dis- 
cussion conclude to break camp and move to 
Jessups River. At eight o'clock we are on the 
trail, which from Spruce Lake to Jessups River 
is very plain and easy to cover, but the tramp 
from Piseco crossing to our camping place is 
very irregular, in fact, as Giles says, muchly 
mixed. 

The river where we first strike it, is a rather 
diminutive stream, yet affording fair fishing. 
It grows rapidly in volume receiving the water 
of almost innumerable tributaries and where we 
make our camp, about five miles below the 
Piseco trail, it has grown to be a grand trout 
stream. Rapids and rocks alternate with still- 
waters and alders, riffs, and quiet pools offer their 
treasures to those who seek them. It is real 



86 RANDOM CASTS. 



brook fishing, than which there is no greater 
sport for any lover of good Isaac Walton, and 
the art he so quaintly and eloquently describes. 
Lake fishing is all very well in its way, but it is 
lazy sport this standing on a raft or sitting in a 
boat, paddling from spot to spot where fishes 
" most do congregate," with not half the pretty 
views that charm the eye as you follow brook 
or river among the woods and mountains. 

Now, before we commence fishing, let us 
have a little chat about wading. Do not wear 
any of the heavy high top boots, advertised to 
keep the feet dry, as they are all humbugs, but 
get a pair of tightly laced shoes, that support 
the ankles, the bottoms filled with large headed 
nails and if there be a hole or two in them never 
mind, as they will let out as much water as they 
let in ; besides a rill of clear cold water running 
around your toes and tickling the soles of your 
feet is a decidedly pleasant sensation. 

If ever anything strayed away from its proper 
abiding place it is a pair of boots in the woods. 



RANDOM CASTS, 87 



No man who values his legs and feet ever ven- 
tures the second time on a fishing- excursion 
when he has to wade the creek with his boots 
on. The first severe tramp causes two or three 
wrinkles to gather in the side of them and they 
soon begin their mission of slowly rubbing the 
skin off your feet. Some may like it well 
enough, but one season was sufficient for me. 

You could hardly wish to see your worst 
enemy in a more miserable plight, than to see 
him of a morning trying to pull on a pair of 
boots he has thoroughly wetted the day before. 
The heel won't drop into position ; it catches 
the counter and hangs as though in a vise. A 
piece of soap to grease the stocking and after 
much geeing and hawing and jerking, the pain- 
ful operation is at an end until the next morn- 
ing, unless you resolve, which is the most sens- 
ible thing you can do, to go to bed with your 
boots on and let your galled feet ache. The 
man who comes with the low heeled, broad 
soled shoes, pitches them off as he retires, and 



88 RANDOM CASTS. 



in the morning fairly jumps into them and finds 
them as easy as a pair of old slippers. 

If, while you are wading the stream some 
treacherous stone, deceiving and tripping you, 
lays you mercilessly down in the water, wetting 
you from head to foot, do not allow your spirits 
to be dampened— that is, you are not compelled to 
drink your Bourbon without a slight decoction 
of Adam's ale, but you must not lose courage ; 
do not growl and whine like an infant. Tread 
very carefully. Faith you will have to do so to 
avoid the Scylla of numerous eddies and the 
Charybdis of frequent boulders, the one strong 
enough, and the other slippery enough to upset 
a careless wader every ten rods of his aquatic 
saunter. 

The very thought is shivering and chilling, 
some one says : Oh 1 you are horrified at the 
bare idea of venturing knee deep into the crys- 
tal water, you'll get your feet wet, you don't 
enjoy " feeling the first cold drop giving notice 
to your great toe that in less than two minutes 



RANDOM CASTS. 89 



your boot will be full of water/' which invari- 
able effects your throat giving you an irritating 
cough or cold, you are not sure-footed enough 
to go prowling among the cobble stones, feeling 
your way across and adown stream, an occa- 
sional misstep might scatter the water over 
your face, which to you would be worse than 
the attack of myriads of musquitoes. You 
relish water in a tumbler or a wash-basin, but 
dear, darling, delicate little tenderling, you 
wouldn't strike out like a true angler, wading 
the stream, even if a temporary wetting secured 
for your basket its overflow of fish. Undoubt- 
edly you are a near relative of the woman who 
forbid her little boy going near the water until 
he had learned how to swim. 

If so, and you are afraid of rheumatism, wet 
feet, cough and cold, remain in the house, smoke 
your pipe, read Shakespeare, Dickens, Haw- 
thorne, Irving, go out on the lawn and play cro- 
quet with the ladies, only keep your feet dry, 
but for " all that are lovers of virtue and dare 



9 



RANDOM CASTS. 



trust in Providence and be quiet and go a ang- 
ling," for the love they bear towards rods, lines, 
and the game they capture, the sport and ex- 
citement of landing a lordly fish counterbalances 
over and over again their fears of ducking and 
drenching. Indeed, no fear or thought of ill- 
ness enters their minds, for well they know that 
a change of clothing and a little extra care after 
the day's sport is finished, will prevent it. 

Down the river, a few rods below the shanty, 
we espied a lovely little bank, where we rest 
and arrange preliminaries. Surveying with sat 
isfaction his rod, line and reel, examining mi- 
nutely the leader and flies, Grey pronounces 
himself ready and stepped into the water. The 
fly is dancing on the riffs, and woe to the greedy 
fish that sees and attempts to capture the decep- 
tive insect, for like Shy lock, we are deter- 
mined to have our pound of flesh, and unlike 
Shylock, we have it, for ere thirty and one sec- 
onds have passed, that insinuating combination 
of feathers and floss, artistically concealing a 



RANDOM CASTS. 9 1 



small piece of sharp pointed steel, has taken hold 
in retaliation of a biting, something whose strug- 
gles leave no doubt as to its identity. A few- 
minutes and he is worked ashore. He is a fair 
fish, exactly large enough to convince Grey that 
his tramping and wading promise a satisfactory 
result and besides accelerated Storm's move- 
ments, for that youngman was still standing on 
the bank lazily busy with the inspection and 
arranging of his tackle. 

" Ned, how is that for a commencement ? '' 

" Good enough ! Indeed it's splendid, and 
you'll only have to continue doing so for an 
hour to fill your basket.'' 

" It's doubtful if I strike so fortunately again 
in two hours.'* 

" Yes you will in less than fifteen minutes. 
When Good Luck befriends a man she doesn't 
desert him so quickly." 

" Well, here's hoping for a continuation of 
Fortune's smiles ; " and away go the flies alight- 
ing like a feather amid the slippery ripples. 



92 RANDOM CASTS. 



One for each of us as I'm a sinner, and Grey's 
of course the largest, but not a word spoken 
after we have well commenced the day's sport. 

Is not this sport above all other recreation ? 
To be on a trout stream with nothing to break 
the stillness save the ripples of the waters, the 
wind whispering through the foliage of the 
trees, the music of the birds, your own bosom 
full of quiet pleasant thoughts, in harmony with 
the scene, is almost the perfection of human 
happiness. 

A careful throw in yonder pool, a pool so 
still and mirror like, that it reflects the smallest 
bird flying in the sky above. Here it is where 
quiet and caution are indispensable auxiliaries of 
success, so give good heed to Beppo's injunc- 
tion to Fra Diavolo, and make no noise. 

What a promising place for a big trout just 
above that high rock. I know there is an old 
settler living close by and I shall try to scrape 
an acquaintance with him. He can tell me, if 
so inclined, such delightful stories of olden 



RANDOM CASTS. 93 



times, the sights he has seen and may possibly 
give me some points that will be ol service to 
me in dealing with others of his tribe ; so creep 
along quietly, as if it were a rich man's house 
you were breaking into. The gentleman trout 
is no lover of the rough boisterous dweller ot 
the upper world. He likes the quiet sly devils 

of the Major Bagstock sort, " the de velish 

sly. " 

Down goes the gay deceiver, out runs a few 
yards of line, ample testimony that the old 
gentleman is at home and communicative to a 
pleasant degree, but a gentle pressure of the 
thumb upon the reel awakens him to a sense ol 
the dangerous visitor he is entertaining. A 
wolf in sheep's clothing has called to pay his 
lespects, and our host gives us anything but a 
cordial welcome when the mask is torn off re- 
vealing our true character. 

One moment please ! As the boy remarked 
to his father, who was about to chastise him ; 
11 hold on a moment dad, and let's argy the 
thing." 



94 RANDOM CASTS. 



Come, come, you must not leave us so ab- 
ruptly, and we will not take your hint to make 
ourselves scarce ; there is too much brass in our 
composition. We are as impudent as Fighting- 
Fitzgerald ; you cannot even kick us out, al- 
though you may pull a mite harder on the line 
if you please. That was a glorious somersault, 
worthy of Walter Aymour, but it failed to dis- 
lodge the hook. You are heading for that fallen 
tree, that stretches its arms half way across the 
stream. Going to mix things and spoil my 
visit ? We will give you a couple of turns to 
prevent that piece of strategy from being con- 
summated. Yes, certainly, you may go down 
the stream aways, if it will oblige your lordship. 
The deuce ! you are giving me a pretty chase, 
aren't you, you blackguard ? How do you im- 
fagine I can go splashing through the water at 
such a rate, when I touch the smooth cobbly 
bottom, nearly tripping myself at every step ? 

Did ever heartless coquette lead love sick 
youth such a chase, only to desert him, when 



RANDOM CASTS. 95 



he imagined everything secure and rose color- 
ed ? Did ever love sick youth feel more thor- 
oughly disgusted and miserable than Storm, 
when chuckling to himself with anticipated tri- 
umphs, back to him came hooks and flies with 
naught upon them. 

There is nothing in the world that will engen- 
der momentary thoughts of suicide quicker 
than the loss of a trout, after he has given your 
tackle and your skill an opportunity of testing 
his metal and resources. Your money may take 
wings ; your sweetheart run away with some 
other and better looking fellow, but you go 
bravely to work to repair your fortune, you 
look around and find some other loving heart 
truer than the fickle one who has deserted 
you. 

To be sure suicidal thoughts, suggested by ill 
fortune, at losing some speckled beauty, vanish 
in a trice, still they are present on occasions- 
When the heart is in a thrill of excitement, your 
pulse throbbing with eagerness, your fingers 



96 RANDOM CASTS. 



tingling, your face glowing and eyes sparkling 
in a feverish expectancy, to see your almost cer- 
tain capture break loose, little wonder is it you 
entertain thoughts of self destruction. It shows 
your heart is in the right place. It is proof posi- 
tive you are an angler in love with the sport. A 
pot fisherman would have dismissed him with 
no sigh of regret, just as he would have landed 
him with no glow of enthusiasm. 

A Turkish or some other proverb says, " every 
fish that escapes seems greater than it really is,'' 
but Storm keeps within the bounds of reason by 
calculating this one's weight at one ton. Storm 
was always a poor guesser and felt like drown- 
ing himself when this trout broke loose, perhaps 
would, only he thought this was a pretty good 
world to live in, the best he ever saw, notwith- 
standing the petty annoyances one is subject to; 
besides drowning chokes a person, fills him up, 
wets him, and then there was his real estate not 
disposed of in a manner that his children could 
enjoy the full benefit of it, election day was 



RANDOM CASTS. 97 



coming on and he had a vote to cast for his can- 
didate. Last of all he thought of his wife, and 
waded ashore to wait for Senior's consolation. 

When Storm perched himself on an old log, 
fond memory reverted to that magnificent fel- 
low gleaming with purple and gold, who was 
not floundering in his basket, among others of 
his kind, but was having his jaws nursed by 
some sympathizing friend. He had resource to 
the weed, and gloomy thoughts were soon dis- 
pelled. 



98 RANDOM CASTS. 



CAPTER VIII. 



'"Tis sweet to view the limpid waters dance, 

As o'er their pebbly bed they eager rush , 
Or in the sun's effulgence brightly glance, 

As through the mead meandering they gush ; 

Now ringing forth rich music, now all hush, 
While song-birds chant the ever varied lay, 

From out the willow and o'erhanging bush ; 
O, sweet it is to thread the blithesome way, 
Clad in an angling guise, to spend a happy day." 



"The ruling passion of a Yankee born 
Is, to cut down a tree ; the only use 
He thinks it made for — save, perhaps, to burn 
Or split it up into rails* 



Down the River — Pretty Things — A Quixotic Attempt 
— Discharge of Wilgus. 



r^ILES and Wilgus were instructed to move 
camp about four miles down the stream, and 
have everything ready for our comfort when 
we arrived in the late afternoon. We calculated 
that after having a day's sport, the end of it 
would find us near home, thus saving us a weary- 
ing return trip, and besides, have at hand new 
fishing grounds for the morrow. 



RANDOM CASTS. 99 



Jessups River fills all the requirements for a 
perfect trout stream, and not the least important 
next to its finny treasures is its ram's horned- 
ness. Its course cannot be too winding and 
-tortuous, for we are ever looking forward to the 
delightful uncertainty of the surprise, the next 
bend in the stream will reveal, speculating on 
the probable characteristics of the picture it 
will present. ' Angling up or down a crooked 
stream, renders one almost insensible to time or 
distance, and if one allows his love of the pic- 
turesque and beautiful in nature a loose rein, 
when he comes to his home thoughts he will 
find himself much further from camp than he 
had reckoned on. Keep your mental watch 
wound up. 

Almost every rod presents a new picture and 
every one pleasing. Here towering rocks, al- 
most hidden with their luxuriant growth of 
vines, loom high above our heads, here a wild 
tumultuous mingling of ponderous rocks and 
stately trees, with here and there a few clinging 



100 RANDOM CASTS. 

myrtles, while below at the water's edge, are 
the trunks of fallen trees, drippping and hung 
with the richest greenest moss, always moist 
with the pearly dew or the spray from the rush- 
ing waters. A little further down are trees 
covered with masses of lichens and boulders 
covered with moss, dropping the coolest and 
most pellucid waters ; and the next bend in the 
stream reveals long ranges of shadowy hills, 
beautified by the dim haze of distance and 
bounded by others so high that they seem not 
more substantial or enduring than the clouds 
they pierce. Here the trees and rocks are mas- 
ters of every inch of ground, but a little below 
they have generously given a space for the flow- 
ers to bloom down by the water's edge, where 
snow-white lilies bend their pale spotless faces 
toward the water, seeking like a pretty maiden, 
to catch their own reflection. Golden butter- 
cups nod coquettishly at every passing breeze, 
blue violets peep upwards from among the 
grasses, and there are daisies too, and blue bells, 



RANDOM CASTS. IOI 



and little pink flowers, the squaw berry and 
waving- ferns. Just below, a large tree has fallen 
across the stream, over which the water pours 
forming a pretty falls. Down further is a minia- 
ture island, and just beyond a point jutting out 
into the stream, around which the water curls 
angrily as if maddened that any obstacle should 
interpose to prevent its free flow. Further on 
are more flowers, more rocks, more trees, sand- 
banks, shady pools, dense alders, each turn in 
the stream, showing a different picture, pretty, 
though sometimes rough. 

It is not the prettiest things that are always, 
and to every one, the prettiest, for the home- 
liest things are sometimes the prettiest. A 
rustic bridge of rough rocks or unhewn logs, 
even if its roughness is unhidden from the eye 
by climbing vines and flowers, may be pretty. 
A quaint old fence, even of rails, may be prettier 
than one carefully constructed, leveled, plumb- 
ed and measured. What fun-loving boys or 
girls do not see more beauty in an old swing- 



102 RANDOM CASTS. 



ing gate, upon which they can ride imaginary 
races, than in one of the ponderous iron ones, 
covered with flowery designs ? An old straw 
hat or bonnet thrown carelessly on their heads 
makes many a rustic damsel beautiful as a fancy 
picture, but place one of the latest style upon 
their heads and the transformation from beauty 
to positive ugliness would be complete. Where 
can you find a prettier girl than Fanchon in her 
rags ? Pretty houses are sometimes no prettier 
than old tumble down barns or log-cabins or 
bark shanties. Don't you think the house you 
were born in, the prettiest and cosiest you ever 
saw ? Yet, perhaps, it has no flower garden 
like the one opposite, nor tall shade trees, nor 
graveled walk, but only a narrow path in the 
middle of the potatoe and cabbage path in front. 
Don't you think your little sister or baby, 
the prettiest and dearest in the whole wide 
world, even if the dirty little savage is now up 
stairs yelling like a Sioux or Comanche brave, 
with the scalp of a pale face dripping from his 



RANDOM CASTS. 103 



hand ? Was ever one blessed with such a noble 
father or gentle mother as you, even if your 
back is still smarting with deserved pain inflict- 
ed by one or the other? 

The trees you sported under, the old horse 
sheds where you played woolley and pompey- 
smash, the little pond where you fished with a 
bent pin and piece of twine, the brown school- 
house by the village green, the shady bridge 
near the blacksmith's, where you sold the horse- 
shoes and scraps of iron you were lucky enough 
to find, the old cider mill you used to visit after 
school and on Saturday afternoons, with your 
hands full of carefully selected straws, through 
which you sucked the sweet juices ; are not all 
of these pretty yet, though your head is silvery 
now and your walk slow ? Yes, they are pretty, 
and their roughness helps to make them so. 

There are pretty spots on this creek, where 
we fished to day, and it is only the little flowers, 
the great rough trees and rocks and hills that 
make them so, and some people might see them 



04 RANDOM CASTS. 



every day, and yet pass blindly by and know- 
no beauty in them. They can see nothing 
pretty or beautiful except in a shop window or 
a woman's face, and pronounce — , well, my 
friend, you cannot see what 1 am driving at, as 
I cannot keep myself on the right track, but am 
continually switching off; but I have been 
vainly trying to show how pretty some homely 
things are, and how often we see really pretty 
things and fail to discern their beauty, just as I 
have stupidly failed to clearly express my 
thoughts. 

However, it don't matter. I see beauty in 
the woods, in piles of logs and stones, winding 
roads, gnarled trees, old barns, old fences, old 
friends, I care not how old or homely. I sup- 
pose it is memory, taste, association, that makes 
things beautiful and — and I guess you com- 
mence to wonder, this time in real earnest what 
I am driving at, but I could do better and elu- 
cidate the subject more clearly, only I am going 
" a angling " to-day and cannot spare the time, 



RANDOM CASTS. 1 05 



so I will drop line in yonder shady pool, and see 
what will turn up. It ought to be a decent sort 
of fellow, for it's a fine home for a fish. 

Can't I throw a fly on the water without your 
troubling" it ? Come, I want you and you. 
There's enough for that little place so we'll wade 
further down the stream and make a cast in yon- 
der current where one would hardly suppose a 
trout could live, yet, there is no better place to 
be sure of your game, than in the riffs where the 
water will almost take your feet from under you. 
Yes, we are wading the stream just as we des- 
cribed to you yesterday, with the water above 
our knees, and so long as you can keep your feet 
under you, there is no better sport ; but, if you 
lose your balance and souse down in the water, 
ugh ! only a pitiless laugh from any person wit- 
nessing your feet of tumbling is the consolation 
you are rewarded with, unless you can draw the 
article from a pocket flask. 

What we are in search of, come fast as callers 
of a New Years. So we loiter along the edge 



IOG RANDOM CASTS. 

where the stream is narrow, wade where it is 
wide, seeking- out the most favorable places to 
cast a fly, finding them sometimes beneath the 
murky shade of the overhanging banks, at others 
in the swiftest currents and among the little 
white caps, and sometimes in the large still- 
waters that are too deep to be waded entirely 
through, giving us unpleasant trips around the 
alders that encompass them. There is little 
monotony in the style of angling, for every 
quarter of a mile offers the whole list. 

Leisurely we trudge down the river, alluring 
to destruction all that are foolish enough to snap 
at our devices, and many such there were dash- 
ing through the swiftly running riffs, tumbling 
around the slippery cobbles, casting occasional 
glances upward to see if any delicate flies are 
within their greedy grasp, and we caused a mi- 
gration to our baskets of some fair of form and 
beautiful to look upon. 

Hello ! here is the high rock again, where 
Storm lost the savage trout yesterday, after a 



RANDOM CASTS. 107 

grand struggle. Perhaps, the old settler has 
had his wounds dressed after disgorging the 
hook yesterday, been to his mother or his true 
love for a healing kiss, is feeling well and hun- 
gry, ready to respond to our polite attentions, 
eager for another bout with his ancient enemy. 
At all events, his antiquated old adversary is 
anxious to renew hostilities, and on goes a new 
hook, one carefully hidden beneath an alluring 
combination of colored feathers, on the same 
principle that bitter pills are sugar-coated for 
the delicate and sensitive tastes of sick little 
ones. 

" You see the ways the fisherman doth take, 
To catch the fish, what engines doth he make ? 
Behold ! how he engaged all his wits, 
Also his snares, lines, angles, hooks and nets ; 
Yet fish there be, that neither hook nor line, 
Nor snare, noi net, nor engine can make thine ; 
They must be groped for, and be tickled too, 
Or they will not be catched what e'er you do." 

Very well, Mr. John Bunyan, and 

" If these won't make him, 
The devil take him." 

for Mr. Edward E. Storm, can't. 

" L'homme propose, 
Et trout dispose." 



108 RANDOM CASTS. 

Verily, it proved a quixotic attempt for the 
handsome old vetern was now a non-conformist, 
and would not take hold. He scorned every 
allurement. He was not to be coaxed, intimi- 
dated nor bull-dozed. Half a dozen different 
styles and courses were placed before him, but 
there was nothing in our bill of fare dainty 
enough. Raw nor well done, fat nor lean, 
would suit the long-headed epicurean old rogue, 
he remembered his yesterday's experience, 
cocked one eye upwards, and said : 

" Though, this may be play to you, 
' Tis death to me." 

Gave his rudder a turn, set sail and was away. 
Not any for me, I thank you ; appreciate your 
motions and notions, and motives and all that 
sort of thing, you know, my dear fellow, but 
cannot possibly, under any circumstances, as- 
sist in filling that basket to-day, because — be- 
cause, well, because, I'll see you hanged first, 
and then I won't. Good morning. Ah, ha ! 
here is one, and Grey has just put the finishing 
touches on another, a beautiful one, the pride of 



RANDOM CASTS. 1 09 



the family, a broad-backed pugilistic looking 
sinner, affording Grey a deal of fine sport be- 
fore he mastered him, Storm was positive he had 
caught the largest fish, but Grey held up his 
last capture, and sang : 

" No, no, no, not for Joe, 
Not for Joseph, not for Joseph, 
Oh, dear no ; Oh, dear no ; 
Not for Joseph, not for Joe." 

Our arrangements and instructions regarding 
our new camping place, properly carried out, 
would have warranted us in expecting to find 
everything ship-shape, but on reaching it at 
evening, we found " confusion worse confound- 
ed,'' a very Gordian knot and bable of confu- 
sion, Giles had built, and furnished a new 
shanty with all the modern improvements, and 
Wilgus had put the finishing touches to it by 
felling a tree across it, while Giles was away 
doing some fishing on his own account, and the 
natural sequence was a hetrogeneous mass of 
spruce bark, tin pails and kettles, hard-tack and 
hemlock boughs, blankets and bacon. 

" in one red burial blent." 



110 RANDOM CASTS. 

Wilgus was seated on a convenient stump, 
growling at the luck and attributing it to every- 
thing but his own stupidity. It was the last 
blunder that broke Grey's patience, and he 
said: 

" You are a constitutional blunderer and 
growler. In season and out of season, you 
must have your little growl. You would growl 
at your own shadow, if you could find nothing 
more substantial upon which to vent your 
spleen. The whole matter is, you are too ener- 
getic and enterprising in your laziness. You 
never lose your grip on indolence, and always 
manage to get the underhoid. Now, Mr. Wil- 
gus, you must take a back seat and remain there 
very quietly, indeed, I put my arm around your 
neck and speak in the n\ost friendly manner, 
and for your own good. I am heartily sick 
of this infernal and eternal fault-finding, stu- 
pidity and laziness, and now dear Mr. Wil- 
gus, no more 01 it. In the morning you and 
your old bamboo follow the river down or up 
or cross-lots, I care not which, and you'll 
reach home all right.'' 

Wilgus resigned next morning. 



RANDOM CASTS. I 1 1 



CHAPTER IX. 



4< Thou pausest not in thine allotted task, 
O, darkling river ! through the night I hear 
Thy wavelets rippling on the pebbly beach, 
I hear thy current stir the rustling sedge 
That skirts thy bed. Thou intermittest not 
Thine everlasting journey, drawing on 
A silvery train from many a woodland spring 
And mountain brook." 

Bryant. 



" But, Johnie, I maun, as ye'r frien' warn ye 
That it's no' the fly, nor the water, nor the rod, 
Nor the win', nor the licht, can dae the job, 
Wi' oot the watchfu' e'e and steady han', and 
A feeling for the business that's kin' o' born wi' 
A fisher ; but hoo that comes aboot I dinna kin." 

Donald Macleod, D. D. 



Sunrise — The old Whiskey Bottle — Strategic Angling 
— Life and the Stream. 



" What envious streaks 
Do lace the swerving clouds in yonder east? 
Night's candles are burnt out and jocund day 
Stands tip toe on the misty mountain top." 



^HE trees were brightening up, nodding a 
neighborly good morning to each other, and 
to the delicious zephyrs which were playing 
along the shore, wafting the sweet perfume of 
flowers and plants and the fresh smell of the 



112 RANDOM CASTS. 



river way up to the shanty, rousing- every in- 
mate from tiniest midget to mammoth Senior. 

Up, up, crept the sun, its slanting rays danc- 
ing among the ripples of the river, dewdrops 
gemmed the leaves, sparkled on ferns and 
flowers which awaited the warm kisses of the 
morning to exhale their incense. Flowers, 
ferns and bushes waltz to the music of the winds, 
merrily whispering the while to the breezes 
as they pass. The birds began their songs, fill- 
ing the deep woods with sharpest, shrillest 
music, which the mountain echoes returned ten- 
fold, at first sharp and shrill as their copy, but 
the far away hills sent back their answer mel- 
lowed by the distance, and sweeter even than 
the little birds could make it. Grand masses ot 
snow white clouds loom up like mountains of a 
new land. The dewy freshness of this soft, 
lovely morn gives promise of one of the love- 
liest days that ever gladdened a year. 

This is the place above all others for a Polic- 
ing spree and a drinking bout conducted on 



RANDOM CASTS. 1 13 



purely hygienic principles. The pine scented 
air is so exhilerating as to be almost intoxicat- 
ing. You can drink it in until there comes 
something akin to that feeling of perfect rest 
and content, that lays hold on a man when he 
becomes dead drunk and don't care a snap. 
Not a hair shall pull in the morning ; you shaL 
awake at the rising of the sun, bright as a newly 
coined dollar, and find your hat still fits you. 

If you are foolish enough to want the ordin- 
ary or plebian drunk go somewhere else, 
though some people do come here for no other 
purpose in the world, than to desecrate " God's 
first temples," and more's the pity that they 
ever find their way back to the proprieties of 
civilization. Such people always contend, that 
the first and most important portion of one's 
supplies should be whiskey, and lots of it, but, 
to silence any dissenting voice, would perhaps, 
acquiesce in adding a beggardiy crumb of bread. 
Bread, according to their ideas and tastes, has 
about as much business with whiskey, as the 



114 RANDOM CASTS. 

walking stick of a kid-gloved exquisite, has 
with the main mast of an admiral's flagship. 

A real lover of angling never allows his 
brains to be stolen away in such a manner. He 
respects himself, and loves his quiet sport too 
much. " He is cheerful and free from swearing 
and scurrilous discourse." " He loves such sport 
as does not make friends ashamed to look upon 
one another next morning.'' A flask of good 
liquor in camp is absolutely necessary, but had 
better be smashed against the first rock, than ta- 
ken except when taken medicinally, Honest In- 
jun. If you must drink, have your rations regu- 
larly, take a draught of spring water. u It is 
the poorest in which to drink another's health, 
but, the best in which to drink your own,'' and, 
" charity begins at home," as the Indian philoso- 
pher, says : " Whiskey and water mixed, are 
two good things spoiled," but, the whiskey gets 
the better of the fusion, and the more water the 
better grows the whiskey 



RANDOM CASTS. I I 5 

" But, to our sport, around yonder turn in the 
stream are two immense rocks, protecting 
three sides of a deep, dark pool, shaded by 
venerable trees on the land side, and guarded 
against fly throwing, by a growth of bushes that 
defy any attempt to cast a hook in the ordinary 
manner, light enough to allure any of its deni- 
zens. Indeed, one might easily pass and repass 
the spot without for a moment, mistrusting that 
behind that tangled front of brush was a quiet 
pool, where for years and years no ray of sunlight 
had entered, where when wishing '■ to steal 
awhile away from every lingering care," the 
trout could hide and wait in safety for the food 
borne down by the current secure in the faith, 
that all the flies and bugs that ventured with- 
in the boundaries of his retreat were what they 
looked and no counterfeit presentments. 

Grey stumbled across the pool a year ago, 
and brought two pounds of brook trout in one 
section from it. He waded up to the brush and 
rocks one day, carefully noted distances, inter- 



Il6 RANDOM CASTS. 



nal arrangements, the current, cut away a few 
twigs near the water, and in one minute had the 
whole place engraved " in his mind's eye.'' The 
next day he put a fly on the spot, with the 
above result. 

" How did he succeed in accomplishing the 
impossible ? " He repeated the trick to-day. 

Grey went into the woods, found a piece of 
bark and placing a grizzly king upon it, launched 
it forth, watched it as it entered the current in 
front of the two big rocks, saw it sucked in be- 
neath the overhanging bushes and disappear. 
In four seconds Grey gives a slight jerk, the 
slightest jerk upon the line, and the fly is sup- 
posed to be floating in the dark pool. Only one 
fly enters those almost sacred precincts. One 
fly, if it performs its mission, will suffice to test 
to the uttermost, the strength of your tackle 
and the degree of your skill. 

You must be a graduate in good standing from 
the school of Isaak Walton, the school of " sim- 
ple, wise men," to meet the first rush of that 



RANDOM CASTS. WJ 

handsome devil who has taken your fly. The 
line tautens, you are almost conscious of having 
received a shock from an electric battery. Like 
a bull after a red bandana, the trout has rushed 
after the grizzly king with unbridled appetite. 
You must lead him to open water and that right 
speedily, else the two big rocks and the bushes 
surrounding his lurking place become danger- 
ous allies. On the line comes a strain, such as 
you would not dare give it, save in this instance. 
It is your only hope. He may chaff the leader 
against the rock, he may take a half-hitch 
around some snag or tangle the line in the bush- 
es to give your tackle the last ounce it will 
bear, and lead your captive out into daylight. 
Now, its a fair field and no favor. You cannot 
afford to be indolent, though your sport is called 
idleness by those ignorant of its requirements. 
You must be superlatively cunning, for the 
trout is an arrant rogue, and yet, how readily 
we forgive him his little foibles, when we have 
him on the end of a line or the prongs of a fork. 



118 RANDOM CASTS. 



Splash ! splash ! he rises, reflecting brilliant 
radii as he rushes to the sunlight, head, tail and 
fins, a whirling periphery. Cry in vain for 
mercy. Grey has hauled up the black flag ; 
will give no quarter, will ask for none. 

Whistle line, sing reel, there's music ; bend 
pliant rod, there's an artist controlling you, a 
man true as steel, cold as an iceberg. Little 
difference to his nerves, be it trout, clam, shark 
or stick of wood, for he would manage one and 
all of them with the same intrepidity, dash and 
nonchalence. How the handsome fellow, gam- 
est of the game, does fight. The trout, with 
all his cunning, his fierceness, and his intense 
appetite, is an aristocrat and a gentleman, the 
gentleman, par excellence, of the finny tribe, 
and it is the gentleman the world over, who on 
provocation or necessity, will make the best 

fight. 

The more zeal one evinces for his favorite 
sport, the better his appetite. 



RANDOM CASTS. 119 



" I'm growing hungry in spite of the sport. 
That's our present trouble. There is a weak 
spot, and the symptoms indicate it to be in the 
vicinity of the digestive organs. Here is some 
hardtack, a cold chicken and sandwiches of 
pilot-bread, ham and potted beef. Hungry ? 
Yes, that is what they call it. Either of us 
could have eaten a horse and his rider. Pitch 
in ! There is plenty, unless you have an appetite 
like the man who won a match by eating a pig 
and an apple pie. 

Did ever luxurious ottoman, unless there was 
a young lady to share it with you, afford a more 
inviting seat than this mossy bank, with one of 
the prettiest trout streams in the world flowing 
at our feet, grand old woods at our backs ? Not 
a cloud to be seen in the transparent air, noth- 
ing but the sky above and the foliage below, 
through which plays the golden sunlight, cast- 
ing shadows across the stream that winds its 
course irregularly between the hills and over 
the rocks, quietly and noisily, merrily and sul- 



120 RANDOM CASTS. 

lenly, carelessly and carefully like a spoiled 
child, ever changing its moods. 

How like human life is this stream, now clear 
and sparkling as diamonds, flowing noiselessly 
as a child's sweetest slumbers, when angels 
guard its cradle, now murmuring and every 
murmur melody, every ripple music, now rush- 
ing on happy and free as playing children, laugh- 
ing as it rolls over the slippery cobbles, eating 
angry scollops beneath the banks, wearing slowly 
but surely its way under the trees and exposing 
the grotesque frame work of their roots, which 
it has washed so white and clean, dashing over 
and around rocks, zig-zaging its way among fallen 
trees and then it pitches over some huge rocks, 
groaning as it falls, the tears trickling down the 
outer edges and falling into the deep Avater be- 
low. On it goes through whirlpools of trouble 
and danger, now groaning loudly, now subsiding 
into silence, mingling with the shade, rushing, 
rollickingly out into the glorious sunshine, as 
though it loved the warm kisses of the summer 



RANDOM CASTS. 121 



sun, dancing- to its own wild music, the little dia- 
mond crowned wavelets chase and court each 
other like living- things. Idle enough it was, 
careless in the sunshine, lazy as it ran where 
the dark shadows are thrown across. 'Twas 
the merriest of merry streams, whether it sang 
tinkling- like silver bells in the sunlight or 
whether it dreamed in the shade by waving 
ferns and clustering alders. 

Here wearied of its journey, it widens out 
into a lake-like expanse, quiet and silent almost 
as death, then gaining new life and strength 
from its sleep, it dashes with renewed force, 
sailing majestically away, swallowing here and 
there a tiny rill from the mountain side, until it 
is itself swallowed up and lost. 

Laugh and cry, complain and rejoice, hush, 
shout, peace, brawl, wayward stream, " 'twas 
ever thus, since the morning stars sang to- 
gether,'' and so 'twill be when we have landed 
our last fish, reeled up and crossed the dark 
river into the heavenly light beyond. 



122 RANDOM CASTS. 



High up in the trees, rocking themselves on 
the swinging branches, the birds pour forth 
their cataracts of song. Here and there little 
specks of sunlight sleep upon the ground, dot- 
ting it with golden shapes, while occasionally as 
the wind gently moves the leaves a light little 
fellow will jump to chase its playmates and run 
riot all around. The bird music, the hammer- 
ing of a wood-pecker, the drumming of a part- 
ridge and the chat of an idle squirrel impatiently 
waiting for us to move, that it may feast upon 
the crumbs which have fallen from our table, 
and the murmur of the river, are the only sounds 
which break the impressive silence. 

Throw the bones away, brush away the 
crumbs. That was an enjoyable little lunch as 
luncheons eaten beneath shade trees, by flowing 
water and growing grass, ought ever and al- 
ways to be, even if the contents of your larder 
are plainest of the plain. You want no farina- 
ceous puddings and fancy cakes or confectioner's 
knick-knacks, but a thick slice of Indian bread, a 



RANDOM CASTS. I 23 



slice of sweet ham, and from time to time a swal- 
low of cold water from a mountain spring, will 
make a meal not to be despised by any hungry 
man. Give your imagination a little scope if 
you are at all fastidious in your tastes and noth- 
ing can be more palatable. Here in the woods 
there is no need of being so particular as the 
starving men who refused a proffered cucumber, 
because it was crooked 



124 RANDOM CASTS. 



CHAPTER X. 



" It is a sultry day ; the sun has drank 
The dew that lay upon the morning grass ; 
There is no rustling i.i the lofty elm 
That canopies my dwelling, and its shade 
Scarce cools me." 



" Here we go up, up, up, 

And here we go down, down, downy ; 
Here we go backwards and forwards 

And here we go round, round, roundy." 

Old Nursery Rhyme. 



'' 'Twixt the fir-tree skirted ranches, 

Where the Rattling Run doth shine 
We erect out hut of branches. 

Roof of birch bark, wall of pine ; 
Floor it with the bcughs of saplings, 

Fragrant, soft as couch of kings, 
Rioting in forest pleasures 

And the sleep that labor brings. 

Gen!o C. Scott. 

A Warm Tramp — The Upper Stillwater and High Falls 
Our Shanty — A Long Night. 



^HESE are samples of the days we spend on 
Jessups River. We fish it from the Piseco 
Trail to the old military road, and beyond al- 
most to Indian Lake. Then, back to the road, 
where we leave the river and go to Sturges at 



RANDOM CASTS. 125 



the head of Lake Pleasant. From there we 
wagon it to the head of Piseco Lake, sail to the 
fort and walk a pleasant eight miles to Becraft's. 
Again, into the woods on the trail to the Up- 
per Stillwater. Now, we meet old Mr. Cork- 
screw himself, disguised as a trail about ten 
miles long, having more twistings, turnings and 
angles, than any geometrical problem, but, " to 
Indian eyes, I sometimes think that even a hum- 
ming-bird leaves its trail in the air," and our 
guide familiar with every step in the vast net^ 
work of the forest, leading us, we zig-zag our 
way around wind -falls, conquer the difficulties 
of precipitous descents, hang by our teeth, as 
we climb over rocks and prostrate trunks, tum- 
ble up hills, the uphillishness of which approxi- 
mates the perpendicular, with perhaps, a slight 
inclination towards us, pull like draught horses 
through soft marshy places too extensive to be 
flanked, though there are times when the long- 
est way round is the shortest way home. 



126 RANDOM CASTS. 



Tripping up and falling outstretched, the 
trick of some treacherous root half hidden or 
more, beneath last year's leaves, hats lifted off 
and deposited on the ground just behind us as 
we pass under the low branches of some young 
tree, are only a few of the petty annoyances 
with which we contend. Here, a noisy brook- 
let to be crossed, affords us grateful invigorating 
stimulant, bracing us up and preparing us for 
another stretch. 

Warm ? we almost wished our lot had been 
cast for that day, at least, in Alaska or Siberia. 
Such a day it was that one might well wish with 
Sidney Smith, that we could " take off our flesh 
and sit in our bones." Hardly a breath of air 
stirring, and what little there was, seemed to 
come from a dry brush heap. 

To many, the hard tramps experienced in 
reaching the different lakes is a serious, almost 
insurmountable barrier, protecting the trout to 
a greater extent than the game laws, but our 
quartette value highest whatever is most diffi- 



RANDOM CASTS. 1 27 



cult of attainment, and, we firmly believe, the 
tribute we will compel the Stillwater to yield, 
will amply compensate us for all present per- 
plexities and discomforts. Though an intricate 
trail to follow, "'tis a long road that has no end- 
ing," and after a weary- tramp, the Upper Still- 
water stares us in the face and smiles a wel- 
come, or looks bright enough to tell us that 
our coming is propitious. 

The Upper Stillwater is about two miles 
long, varying in width from two hundred feet to 
ten feet or less, and in places the alders on 
either shore almost meeting across the water, 
leave barely space enough through which to 
pull your raft. From no one point can any con- 
siderable portion of the stream be seen, as its 
turnings completely shut out any extended 
view, but, each turn reveals a pretty picture. 
There is scarcely any preceptible motion to the 
water, and your raft will always go with the 
wind. 



128 RANDOM CASTS. 



A mile or so above the head of the Still- 
water are the Walton Falls, which are among 
the highest in the Eastern States. They are so 
high, you have to look up twice to see the top. 
The best way to see them, is to climb to the top 
and look up. An accurate measurement of them 
has never been made, but three hundred feet 
will not more than cover them, and most people 
would calculate their height at nearer four hun- 
dred feet. The volume of water flowing over 
them is not extensive, except during the spring 
floods when the face of the falls would show a 
width of sixty feet. During our visit, about 
twenty feet was the breadth, and it took the 
form of what is known as the Bridai-vaii Falls. 
Standing by the bottom of the great deep pool 
and looking upwards, one can only see about 
half the distance up, as the immense rock over 
which the water tumbles is shaped like a billiard- 
ball, and completely shutting off from view the 
upper half. 



RANDOM CASTS. 1 29 



" Coleridge was admiring a water-fall, and 
overheard a man near him, who said : ' Majestic.' 
The poet turned to him, and said : ' That is the 
very word.' c Yes,' continued the admiring 
rustic, ' it is jest the purtiest, majesticest thing 
I ever seed.' He had the soul to admire and 
enjoy it, but rhetoric was not his forte.'' 

It is a severe climb to reach the top of the 
falls, but doubly repays the effort by the grand 
picture spread out before you, a wonderful pic- 
ture from the hands of the Master Artist. Far 
away into the dim distance, the meeting place 
of earth and sky, the forest was unbroken far as 
the eye could reach, the green waving trees 
claim dominion. Pile on pile, the spruce and 
hemlock, bearded hills so richly and unsparing- 
ly clothed, giving birth to innumerable streams 
and springs; dreamland hills, they seemed, 
looming up in mistiness, almost spectral, barely 
discernable in the hazy distance, range above 
each other, hiding their heads in the clouds and 
forming one grand waving sea of verdure. All 



130 RANDOM CASTS. 



other forest views we ever beheld dwindle into 
insignificence, in comparison. Of the kind, it 
is one of nature's grandest spectacles. Surely, 
the world is a picture-book, God the artist, and 
here, where there is so much loveliness and 
grandeur, with so few to behold, we can well 
believe, that if " man is distant, God is near." 

Half way between the falls and the Stillwater 
are the ice-houses, down deep among the huge 
rocks that have fallen from the face of Bluff 
Mountain, and where, at any season of the year, 
one can procure all the ice he requires for camp 
purposes, and, if so inclined, indulge in a snow- 
balling bout, for he can find ammunition enough 
to supply a district school. On the top of Bluff 
Mountain are the eagle's nests, where, if you 
are unpatriotic enough, you can bag the royal 
bird. 

A downright clever act it was in the previous 
occupants in the Stillwater shanty, and deserves 
its reward, for tired and hungry when we 
reached our journey's end, we found enough 



RANDOM CASTS. 131 

wook cut for the night, pails and pans were 
hung up all in good order, the shanty clean with 
a nice bed of boughs, and everything in as tidy 
a shape, as if some model housewife had had 
control of affairs. The shanty itself, was built of 
nicely trimmed boughs, and well covered with 
wide pieces of bark. According to Grey's 
measurement, it was six feet by seven, while 
Gould made it seven feet by six. Its size was the 
only objection. If five averaged sized men 
were to occupy it at once, they would be 

" Snug, 
As a bug, 
In a rug." 

if not snugger ; and we made a rule, that if any 
one woke up in the night and wanted to turn 
over, he was to yell u flop,'' three times. 
" Flop,'' to wake up the others, u flop," to make 
ready, and " flop," to turn over. The third 
" flop,'' meant business, and if one did not hear 
it he might feel it, by feeling somebody's elbow 
caroming heavily over his nose, or a knee thun- 
dering against his stomach. 



I32 RANDOM CASTS. 

The smooth bark inside was scrawled over 
with absured caricatures and bonmots, every 
man who registered his name having given a 
specimen of his artistic or poetical abilities, 
which ever way his genius dictated. One scene 
represented the sun full-faced, with a thumb at 
its nose, wagging four fingers at two men fishing 
from a raft. Another represented a trout pull- 
ing a man out of the water. The only poetry we 
could decipher, was an extract signed Tennyfel- 
low, which read thus : 

" Blackflies and musquitoes, 
Up hill and down, 
Thunder and lightening, 
To old John Brown." 

Grand, right royal sport it is, tempting the 
cunning trout to partake of the delicate decep- 
tive lures, man's inhumanity has invented to 
decoy them from their chosen retreats, to for- 
sake home and friends, leaving behind old com- 
panions and associates, deserting the scenes of 
trouthood, making the greatest possible sacri- 
fice, that of their lives — to gratify a morbid 



RANDOM CASTS. 1 33 



curiosity, man's amusement and three square 
meals a day. Great, magnificent, grand right 
royal as the sport might be, Senior and Gould 
were too grandly right royally tired out to par- 
take of any exercise save filling their pipes and 
stretching out on the downy boughs of the 
shanty, leaving Grey and Storm to catch the 
supper. 

There were three rafts at the landing, all in 
perfect order, with paddles, poles, anchor cords 
and seats. Senior and Gould fell asleep, and 
did not awaken until Grey and Storm returned 
with thirty or forty small trout fresh from the 
water. 

After supper, the usual rubber of whist. The 
primitive hour of our forefathers for retiring, 
eight o'clock, is strictly adhered to, and that 
sensible old fashioned country hour finds us be- 
tween the blankets courting the drowsy God. 

As Storm rolled his blanket around himself, 
he prayed if ever he did, that this might not be 
a night of such pure and unadulterated misery 



134 RANDOM CASTS. 

as the hrst one he ever passed in this same 
shanty. It was a June night, and murky enough 
to a draw million and one musquitoes and mid- 
gets to the shanty. Frank Squires, a little boy 
of fourteen, rugged, brave and intelligent, was 
Storm's companion. They had tramped from 
Becraft's in the forenoon, fished all the after- 
noon until dark, and wet, tired and hungry 
came back to the shanty, had supper and re- 
tired early, anticipating a snoring good sleep. 
No sooner had they stretched out, than sleep 
claimed them, but could not make its claim 
worth a cent, for down came the fierce musqui- 
toes and midgets in battallions innumerable. 
They may have slept a half hour, and that finish- 
ed Mr. Morpheus. Storm arose and made a 
first class smudge, but bless you a smudge was 
the delight of their hearts ; you might as well 
have attempted to smudge the gentleman with 
the cloven foot. At ten o'clock Storm and 
Frank arose again, fried a pan of trout and after 
eating them, had a smoke, and again tried to 



RANDOM CASTS, 1 35 

capture a forty winks of sleep. Frank put his 
feet and legs in a bag, tied up his head and face, 
but all to no purpose. At eleven o'clock Storm 
asked : " What shall we do the next hour, 
Frank ? '' I think we had better swear a little 
or make a pot of coffee," and the glorious 
moonlight was shining upon the unruffled waters 
and making sport of our misery. 

The coffee was made and downed. Still, the 
musquitoes buzzed lovingly . about their ears, 
and, as though that wasn't enough to make them 
aware of their presence, joined with the midgets 
in levying contributions of royal blood to satisfy 
their desires, until Storm and his companion 
felt as though they were in an inferno, expiating 
some henious offense. At midnight came the 
all important question again : " What shall we 
do the next hour, Frank." " Get up and cook 
a good square supper," and the moon with her 
attendant handmaids, the silvery stars, smiled 
down upon the great unbroken forest. After 
the midnight supper, they laid down again un- 



I36 RANDOM CASTS. 



til nearly one o'clock, but sleep was out of the 
question, so they hustled around and reveled in 
the indiscriminate slaughter of their Liliputian 
familiars. 'Twas worth a king's ransom to let 
one escape, for when one of those diminutive 
devils, a midget, succeeds in effecting an entrance 
through your clothing, he means war to the 
death. There is no surrender on his part. He 
is game as a thorough-bred righting cock, and 
somebody has got to travel, and if you leave, 
he will go with you, so go for him lively, where 
you are, divest yourself of your shirt if needs 
be, and warm him hot and heavy. He is 
far and away the toughest, hardest biter for his 
weight that ever tormented a mortal. Be not 
merciful, for if he escapes through your merci- 
ful feelings, he will hunt you again or worse, 
perhaps, he may open on some of your friends, 
and they may be unkind enough to use a little 
Billingsgate language towards you. One lively 
midget is enough for a full-grown, able-bodied 
man to attend to. You won't be thinking of 



RANDOM CASTS. 1 37 



your Sunday school class while he is feeling for 
you. You'll forget everything you ever learned 
at school, and remember only a few interjec- 
tions and some miscellaneous phrases you 
picked up on the canal tow-path or street cor- 
ners, and if ever you are justified in quoting 
them now is your justification. 

" The darkest cloud always has its silver lin- 
ing." And daylight put an end to the misery, 
and never did the dawning of morn receive 
a heartier welcome than it did from that pair of 
restless watchers 



138 RANDOM CASTS. 



CHAPTER XI. 

" Trust to luck, trust to luck, 
Stare fate in the face ; 
Sure your heart must be easy, 
If it's in the right place." 

Old Song. 

"Among the plagues on earth which God has sent, 
Of ligher torment, is the plague of flies. 
Where wild America in vastness lies. 

There diverse hordes, the swamps and woods infest, 
Banded or singly, there make man their prize." 

Bishop of Quebec. 



" Life with its features ever changing, 

And death with changeless face 
Joy. toil, and luxury, want and pa 
Pictured in motion, form, or stain, 

Found in the fare, a place." 

No Luck — Black Flies and Musquitoes — A Short Lec- 
ture—Pictures in the Fire — " Gluck Auf." 



U j^ORTUNE favors the brave,'' says somebody, 
and somebody was wrong, else we were four 
as arrant cowards as ever stood on sole-leather, 
for all our attempts to coax the game we were 
after, proved abortive in the extreme, they were 
all away with their sweethearts, yet we did not 
lose our patience. 



RANDOM CASTS. 1 39 

" For patience is a virtue great, 
Therefore, we mun \vi' patience wait." 

Accepting- the doctrine that " whatever is, is 
right,'' although our luck was worse than the 
Egyptian plagues for dark flies, light ones, gray, 
red nor white, all the colors of the rainbow, in- 
dividually and collectively, would not suffice to 
tempt the speckled. We place before them 
coaxing morsels, that might be pronounced al- 
most irresistible. Almost, not quite. Almost, 
another sad word. No combination of plain 
nor gaudy tints suited their capricious tastes. 
One might as well have angled for the polar 
star. The little scoundrels are not so blind 
this day, as to be unable to- distinguish between 
a healthy bait and a sharp hook disguised with 
a few tiny feathers. It was just as Giles pre- 
dicted, when he stepped out of the shanty in 
the early morning, and found the water glitter- 
ing like a huge silver basin, with birds, water- 
beetles and dragon-flies, dipping their wings 
in it, and dimpling its surface in their rapid and 
erratic flight. 



140 RANDOM CASTS. 



" No luck this morning," was what he said, 
and he made no mistake. There was nary nib- 
ble, and we must take the luck as men take 
wives for better or for worse, and the luck was 
bad enough. The boy who chased the rainbow 
in search of the pot of treasure, he believed, 
was hanging- at its end, was fully as fortunate as 
we. We had bites, stout ones, such bites and 
then so many of them too, but they were invari- 
ably at the wrong end of the rod, and more of 
an aggravation than of pleasure. We never 
were in love, but have often been fishing and 
caught nothing, yet believe. 

" Tis better to have fished and failed, 
Than never to have fished at all." 

Towards the middle of the forenoon, we all 
came back to the shanty to compare notes. 

" What luck Senior? " 

" I haven't been doing anything so far, and 
have had very little trouble in doing it.'' 

" My case, exactly. They don't appear to 
like my style to-day. How is it with you, 



RANDOM CASTS. 141 



Gould ! Perhaps, you have been doing better. 
Do they take hold ? " 

il What, the trout or the musquitoes ? " 

" The trout, of course." 

" The trout? of course — not but I have had 
some glorious bites at the big end of the rod. 
See here, hands, face and neck, pretty well 
marked, I believe I would pass for a respect- 
able sized trout myself, if I had the fins and so 
would you." 

Black flies and musquitoes ? Some of us had 
very thoughtlessly neglected to bring from 
camp our little bottles of prepared oil and tar, 
and had paid dearly for our forgetfulness. 
Grey, who carried a bottle with ointment, for 
two, had lost it and suffered accordingly for his 
carelessness or misfortune. Musquitoes and 
black flies ? Yes, had you seen us from a dis- 
tance when we shook ourselves, you would 
have thought there was a flock of wild duck 
taking their flight from our illustrious persons, 
only to return when the shaking was finished. 



142 RANDOM CASTS. 



They know a thing or two, do these little pests. 
When you have one or both hands free, they 
will sometimes perch on some convenient leaf 
and watch you with all their eyes, until you 
have both your hands engaged, when down they 
pounce upon you, and often, if you attempt to 
drive them away, it is at the risk of losing a 
fish, and they know it, or at least, act as though 
they do, so don't forget your bottle of oil and tar. 
They swarmed around us thick as sand upon 
the sea shore, cut up their antics under our 
noses to their evident delight, buzzed, filling our 
ears with doleful sounds, smarted our hands, 
stung our cheeks, nearly slaughtered us, and, 
yet their bites were no worse, nor so bad, as the 
dreadfully monotonous songs with which they 
prepare their victims for the sacrifice. If they 
would go about their torturing in a quieter way, 
saying nothing of the death dealing doses they 
inflict, we could better endure the pain, but 
when they laugh at us and torture us to the 
tune of such heathenish music, it is cause suffi- 



RANDOM CASTS. 1 43 



cient to justify a man in striking his grand- 
mother. Slaughter them on your cheeks, crush 
every bone in their bodies between the palms 
of your hands, build fires to smudge them out, 
and they will increase in proportion to the 
effectiveness of your smudge and butchery, so 
do not forget the ointment. 

" Well, this is really discouraging,'' said 
Gould. " Our first experience on the Stillwater, 
is far from pleasant and cheering, and I hardly 
dare to hope for good luck, for fear of disap- 
pointment." 

" Never mind our poor luck this morning, 
sonny,'' said Senior, " it is bound to change. 
Be like Mark Tapley, j oiliest, when you have 
the hardest luck to deplore, Brace up and keep 
up your average. Be gay, when you have no 
more reason than this, to be downcast. Hope 
for a better day and better sport, that will make 
the darkest night shorter, sleep sweeter and 
more refreshing. If it be bad on the morrow, 
then be a stoic, and say, I'll take it as it comes. 



144 RANDOM CASTS. 



That's the shepherd of Salisbury Plains. Take 
it as it comes, my dear boy. The good and had 
things pf this world are strangely mingled, and 
he is happiest who can meet either with com- 
posure ; 

" Come deaf, or come blind, or come cripple : 
O come, ony ane o' them a' ! " 

let your countenance be expressive of mirth 
and hilarity, make it a perpetual protest against 
gloom and fish or no fish, let the flowers of 
pleasure unfold their petals on your face, and 
let the rollicking ha, ha, bubble up from your 
heart and overflow at the lips, like the gush of 
a summer's rill. While no human happiness 
can be complete, while there must be some 
element of sorrow mingled with worldly feli- 
city, some — '' 

" Oh, Senior, go hire a hall and advertise 
yourself. I am going to get something to keep 
off these confounded flies, take a drink and a 
bite, and give the trout another chance to try 
my tackle this afternoon." 



RANDOM CASTS. 14$ 



After a hearty lunch, a quiet smoke, and 
a general annointing of our faces with the tar 
and oil, we make for the rafts once more. 
Storm and Grey paddle to the upper end of 
the Stillwater. They are to fish back until 
they meet the other raft. After awhile, the 
fish come to see us, and such sport as we en- 
joyed is sport always to be remembered. Grey 
had one exceptionally large trout, for this place 
claim his closest attention by his desperate 
rush, and away he went. Then, two came to the 
edge of the raft, did not like the appearance of 
things and refused to tarry. Meanwhile, four 
beautiful specimens of their kind had rewarded 
Storm's patience and virtue, when Grey's luck 
underwent a change for the better, and he cap- 
tured any quantity of microscopic little rascals, 
almost as big as oats, just the size to put in milk 
for children. 

As the Highland legions rose to the whistle 
of Rhoderick Dhu, so rose the trout to the ang- 
lers on the rafts, for in every part they were 



I46 RANDOM CASTS. 



anxiously awaiting the hook and feathers to 
drop among them, that they might make amends 
for their unkindness towards us in the morning, 
and as one after another rose to sink no more, 
we made the woods ring and echo with our joy- 
ous and continued hurrahs. There was no let 
up, as we fastened our rafts to the bare arms of 
a venerable tree, lately deceased, that had fallen 
into the water, there was nothing to mar the 
happiness of any, until Grey saw a fair sized 
trout which had been admirably handled, sud- 
denly disappear between the logs of the raft, 
having unhooked himself just as Grey was 
ready to do the agreeable for him. It was a day 
of forgetfulness. We had neglected to bring 
a landing-net and this fish could he have been 
saved, would alone have well repaid us for the 
little extra trouble of carrying one. A person 
should never fish from a raft without having a 
landing-net. In fishing from a boat it does not 
make so much difference, but, even then, it 
sometimes plays an important part, occupies 



RANDOM CASTS. 147 



but little room among- your baggage, and adds 
scarcely any weight to your load. 

A half hour before sunset, we were all fish- 
ing- in the wide part of the stream near the 
shanty, all enjoying the sport, all capturing 
their full share of the ^arae, and never did the 
crooked pin and piece of twine fill the heart of 
an urchin with keener delight, nor the most 
enthusiastic angler appreciate the fishes' fa- 
vors. All of us were as contented as the coat- 
less and shoeless country boy, who sits upon 
the bank of a muddy creek, awaiting the bob- 
bing of the float that detects the presence of 
some greedy little sucker. 

To the shanty we plod our weary way 
healthily tired out, hungry, thirsty, sunburnt, 
almost fly blown, yet happy and cheerful, 
though not loaded down with a superabund- 
ance of game. Though our baskets had been 
heavier, our hearts were never lighter. A 
dozen respectable sized trout, and some small 
ones sandwiched between, in each of our bas- 



148 RANDOM CASTS. 



kets was satisfactory, and we were well enough 
pleased with our last two hours' sport, to forget 
the discouraging prospects of the morning. 

The fire is burning brightly, and such 
generous humane soul and body cheering old- 
fashioned fire that would, in a night, consume 
enough wood to keep a poor family supplied 
with warmth for a whole winter. You could 
have roasted an ox at either end. Within the 
shanty all are gathered. Gould and Senior, 
complacently pulling away at their pipes, 
smoking philosophically and contentedly. 
About five feet ten of Grey lie stretched out, 
boots towards the fire. Storm with a pack- 
basket for a seat, his elbows on his knees, 
his face in his hands, was watching the 
pictures and images among the glowing em- 
bers, though he could not keep track of half 
the fanciful forms that flitted but an instant in 
life. 

Forms and shapes of every description, some 
obscure and dim, others plain and distinct, 



RANDOM CASTS. 149 



seemed coming and vanishing in the air as 
each succeeding blaze shot upwards. First, a 
crowd of merry school children let loose from 
the study room ; they are gone and a funeral 
procession follows with a shrouded coffin, 
plumes that waived like torches, the bowed 
figures ol mourners ; now a tournament as in 
the olden days ot chivalry, with flags and lances 
and battle axes, proud horses carrying their 
riders through the thickest of the fight, grim 
figures playing hide and seek, ugly imps chas- 
ing each other through the crackling embers, 
mothers bending over the cradles of their little 
ones, cats and dogs and wee mice, changing in- 
to beautiful damsels, clusters of purple grapes, 
baskets of rosy peaches, apples turning to 
ashes, garlands of flowers, ships with sails belly- 
ing to the hot wind, old feudal castles and 
grand cathedrals, palaces, high towers and 
pleasant pictures of fairy land, all changing at 
every breath. Our huge fire streamed heaven- 
ward, roaring loudly as "the merry logs of 



150 RANDOM CASTS. 



Algidus,'' casting up clouds of sparks in the 
air. Now and then, some bright wayward lit- 
tle scoundrels would start into the thick woods 
and chase each other until they were tired out, 
leaving the old folks to growl and snap in the 
flashing flames. 

Storm dropped from the pack-basket, Gould's 
tobacco was burned out, Senior could not draw 
another whiff of smoke through his pipe, none 
of us could keep our eyes open, and all were 
soon plunged into unconsciousness, sleeping the 
sleep of tired men. 

We remained at the Stillwater a couple of 
days longer, gave it a thorough whipping and 
despoiled it of some of its handsomest treasures, 
and put back to Becraft's one Saturday after- 
noon. Before we took the back track, a night's 
wood for the next comers was piled up near 
the fire place, the pans and pails we found when 
we came, were washed and hung within the 
shanty, and all of us left wishes and hopes that 
those who followed us, might have such pleas- 
ures as had been meted out to us, and we char- 
coaled upon the shanty sides the famous greet- 
ing of the Cornish miners— a Gluck Auf."* 

* Good luck to you. 



RANDOM CASTS. 151 



CHAPTER XII. 



-glad I mount, 



Into the open air grateful the breeze 

That fans my throbbing temples ; smiles the plains, 

Spread wide below ' how sweet the placid view. 

But, Oh ! more sweet the thought, heart-soothing thought. 

That thousand and ten thousands of the sons 

Of toil partake this day the common joy 

Of rest, of peace, of viewing hill and dale, 

Of breathing in the silence of the woods, 

And blessing Him who gave the Sabbath day." 



" The memory of Sundays gone, is the 
angler's best Sunday company, when he 
is alone in the forest." 

W. C. Prime. 



Snoring — Sunday Morning — The Haunted Church- 
Dinner. 

JN the woods, Senior did not snore. Hem- 
lock boughs acted as a quietus upon that 
accomplishment, but the hour he struck a bed, 
he gave his proficiency, in that respect, full 
play. After our return from the Stillwater, we 
retired early. The drowsy God soon closed 
our eyes in sleep, but what seemed the rum- 
bling of distant thunder raised the heavy eyelids. 



152 RANDOM CASTS. 

The sound proved not to be thunder such as is 
the fore-runner oi a storm, but nasal thunder, 
proceeding- from the most prominent part of 
Senior's face. 

It was the loudest and most thorough snor- 
ing that ever disturbed the slumbers oi wearied 
mortals. Every note on the snorning gamut 
was touched and articulated, only as an artist 
could do it. There was no falsetto, but every 
note pure, true and artistic. He was marvel- 
lously equipped, especially, in the higher notes 
sounding them with an ear and precision 
that comes from years of assiduous practice. 
They might be emulated, but not surpassed. 
It was the complete triumph ot a wonderful or- 
gan. Though he might awaken the enthusi- 
asm and secure the plaudits of an audience, the 
wonder was, why he did not awaken himself. 

He had a variety of tones, of different de- 
grees of power and intensity, with as perfect a 
control over them as Patti or Nilsson have 
over their voices, now deep, long, roaring as 



RANDOM CASTS. 153 

though they came from the pit of his stomach ; 
then short and quick, as if formed and shot out 
from the Adam's apple in his throat ; shorter 
and quicker from under his eyebrows, dashing 
over the bridge of his nose, and the sudden 
spurt has apparently exhausted him, so he 
seems to bring up more deep dolerous reports 
from his paunch and hurls them through the 
house. Occasionally a snort, like the snort of a 
war-horse smelling the battle afar off, would 
make the gray moustache on his lip, quiver like 
an aspen in a hurricane. His lips stuck out as 
though to give the fairy of sleep a resting 
place, a foothold where it could stand guard 
over him ; but bless you child, those snores 
were powerful enough to blow such frail beings 
as fairies are generally reported to be, far away 
to the happy hunting grounds of the red skins. 
We were sorely tempted to awaken him, and 
mourned the want of a patent clothes-pin to 
spring over his nose, but sympathy and good 
nature prevailed over the punishment he really 
merited, so we " let him sleep on/' 



I 54 RANDOM CASTS. 

Heralding with gorgeous pomp the coming 
day, kissing the flowers with its golden light, 
making brilliant the diamond dew drops on 
clover and grass came the Sabbath sun. Birds 
load the air with volumes of melody. The Robin 

" pensive warbler of the ruddy breast." 

perched himself in the thorn apple tree near 
the window, and told us 'twas time to be up ; 
swallows darted hither and thither in graceful 
circles, and twittered from their mud-houses so 
skillfully built beneath the eaves of the barns ; 
the wee humming bird 

" Insect bird of the glowing plume. 
Fairy king of the world of bloom." 

sipped the sweet treasures of the honey-suckle, 
and wooed the choicest kisses of the roses, fat, 
well-fed bees, hummed monotonously, bumped 
their noses against the flowers in search of thir 
breakfast. 

"'Tis for them, 
Unwearied alchymists, the blooming world, 
Nectarious gold distills." 

Butterflies challenging comparison with the 
colors of the flowers, balance up and down 



RANDOM CASTS. 155 

among the sweet clover and play in the sun- 
shine ; gossamer insects commenced buzzing 
and swarming in the light, squirrels, the saucy 
chattering little scoundrels, leaping from bough 
to bough, fearlessly sported and frolicked, and a 
few musquitoes trying to filch a meal from our 
arms and faces, made Senior stop his snoring, 
and the rest of us our dreaming ; while the 
jingling of the bell told us " the wittles is up." 

" What a snorer you are," said Gould to 
Senior, while at breakfast. "We were watch- 
ing you last night, and it any other man can 
produce such an assortment as you, I'll shoot 
him." 

"Yes, I know I am an adept in that respect. 
Once in my sleep I stopped snoring for fully 
ten minutes, and some persons in the house who 
knew me hastened to my room thinking I must 
be dead, and nothing but my commencing the 
concert again could convince them I was only 
sleeping. Since then, to prevent any unneces- 
sary anxiety, I keep the organ going." 



156 RANDOM CASTS. 



It war to be an idle day with all of us except- 
ing- Gould, who, after much wrestling with him- 
self, finally succumbed to his evil promptings, 
and determined to go with a half-witted Dutch 
neighbor of Becraft's as far as the Big Meadows 
and fish the stream 'down. The rest of us visited 
the old church near Morehouseville, with which 
is connected the following story : 

" Years ago a Frenchman named Petchie, and 
his wife, prompted by some unaccountable freak, 
moved to these wilds when they were even wild- 
er than now. He purchased from the State a 
large tract of land, erected a fine house, built 
fences, opened roads", and in various other ways 
displayed his enterprise and spirit. Others fol- 
lowed his example, and soon he had quite a set- 
tlement growing up around him. This church 
was built, and for many years he with his family 
and neighbors worshipped within its walls. 
Petchie had constructed it with his own means, 
and in the center of the graveyard, near the 
church, had reserved a little plot of ground, 
where he and his wife were to be buried. 



RANDOM CASTS. I 57 

"For many years the settlement was a quiet, 
happy place, until at last Petchie 'took' to drink- 
ing, and one day while in a drunken fit angry 
words passed between him and his wife, when 
she stole away to the barn, and when found, had 
hung herself. The priest refused to preach the 
funeral sermon, and forbid her being buried in 
the plct reserved for Petchie, but Petchie's 
neighbors supported the builder of the church 
in his claims, and said ' We would have had no 
church had he not built it.' 

"So strongly did they insist upon her being bur- 
ied in the graveyard of the church that the priest 
was forced to consent, but when the burial ser- 
vices were concluded, he called the members to- 
gether in front of the church, and, going to the 
door, locked it, and in an angry voice said : 'For 
this wicked act of yours, I lock this church and 
lock the devil inside of it. The key I put in my 
pocket.' 

"The priest was never again seen in these 
parts. The superstitious congregation would 



158 RANDOM CASTS. 



never again enter the church, believing that the 
devil was really confined there, but gradually 
moved away, and soon hardly a French Catholic 
was left in Morehouseville. 

"The Church is fast crumbling away. The 
rear, where formerly stood the sheds and out- 
buildings, is now a low, damp marsh, which 
seems literally alive with snakes and lizards. 
In front, surrounded by a dilapidated rail fence 
that even the horses and cattle instinctively 
shun, are Canada thistles, burdocks, milkweed 
and mulleins growing in the richest and rank- 
est confusion. Where once was bloom and fresh- 
ness, is now decay and ruin. The lilies and vio- 
lets have ceased to brighten the little yard, roses 
no longer grace the walk, woodbine and honey- 
suckle climb no more to the eaves and twist 
themselves around the casements. The church 
has lost its white color, the doors and window- 
shutters their green. All is one dark, rusty 
wood color. Sun and storm are the painters 
now. The stone steps are slippery with moss. 



RANDOM CASTS. I 59 

Jackdaws and crows nestle at night in the old 
belfry, and there the owls sleep until the sun is 
down, but no other birds come near. Within, 
the simple altar and oaken crucifix are worm- 
eaten and decayed, almost ready to fall in 

* " And here the droning wasp and bee 

With cunning skill contrive their nests, 
The spider trails its fragile web 
Athwart the heavy oaken beams, 
And constantly the death-watch ticks 
Within the wainscot's dusty seams. 1 ' 

The sweet sound of that, Sabbath bell calling 
the good people to their morning devotions may 
nevermore be borne through the still air of that, 
holy morn. 

"And those whose voices echoed here, 

Whose feet had pressed the church-yard walk, 

Who shall of their long absence tell ? 
Or who their wanderings can mark ?" 

"Their voices may be hushed for aye, 

And feet that vesper never knew, 
From weary walks in life's long day, 

May have the gates of heaven passed through." 

A few months before our visit, a party of ad 
venturous fishermen prompted through curi- 
osity to view his Satanic majesty burst open 
the door. A lightning like whiz was heard, 



l6o RANDOM CASTS. 

and a shadow passed out of the door knocking- 
one unlucky fellow from the slippery steps. 
Whether it was really the devil or the whiskey, 
the fellow was known sometimes to carry, and 
the fact of his standing on rather a slippery 
place, that disturbed his center of gravity is not 
satisfactorily decided — 

" I cannot tell, how the truth may be, 
I say the tale, as 'twas told to me." 

but read the morning papers, and from the ac- 
counts you will there see of murders, robber- 
ies and assaults, you will conclude that " Old 
Nick,'' is not locked up in a church. 

It is said that school and church are hungry 
places. The walk to the church and back had 
put our appetites in splendid order, and Mrs. 
Becraft from her knowledge of our capacities 
had prepared one of her famous dinners. It 
was one o'clock. 

" And then we heard, 
That tocsin of the soul, the dinner bell." 

The great oaken table covered with spotless 
linen, fairly groaned under the load of tame 



RANDOM CASTS. l6l 

chickens and wild trout, flaky biscuit, golden 
butter and amber honey. There were no wines, 
nectar of the Gods. We were only poor mortals, 
and must be content with coffee, but such cof 
fee ; almost the staff of life. The south wind 
breathing o'er a bank of violets has long 
been the poetic idea of voluptuous fragrance, 
but, to a hungry man it is surpassed, far and 
away by the mingling of the exquisite aromas 
arising from a coffee-pot filled with boiling and 
steaming Java or Mocha, and a frying-pan filled 
with juicy trout. 

Chickens and trout beautifully hidden in their 
golden brown coats, were prepared with a deli- 
cacy that defied the skill of other cooks of more 
pretentions. The great china pitcher sweated 
beneath its icy load. We look with eager and 
surprised eyes upon the loaded table, and sight 
is pleased ; our noses give an involuntary snift 
as though the smell was agreeable, and the 
words of Senior 

" Be seated, and what shall I help you to." 

fell like sweetest music upon our ears, Senior 



l62 RANDOM CASTS. 

was a perfect dinner-table surgeon. He han- 
dled the carving knife with a dexterity that 
would have bewildered an expert juggler. 
There were no chunks leaving the big dish, but 
every piece was cut thin, and even a tough 
piece he makes tender by carving it the right 
way. There is no splashing of gravy, no help- 
ing too much and disgusting the appetite, but 
only enongh to make one pass his plate for 
more. The dessert appeared and vanished in 
its order. The salad was so cold and crisp, 
that it sounded, while we were eating it, like 
the starting of a heavily loaded sled of a frosty 
morning, and altogether our dinner would have 
forced groans of agony from a dyspeptic, but 
from us it inspired nothing but contentment and 
inward satisfaction. There was a clean sweep 
of the table, and outside of the salt cellar, the 
pepper-box, the mustard-pot and the vinegar 
cruet, there was not left enough to bait a single- 
barrelled mouse-trap. Everything else was dry^ 
as the contribution box of a bankrupt congrega- 
tion. 



RANDOM CASTS. 163 



CAPTER XIII. 

" Hail to the shocking old straw hat, 

Second hand trowsers, coat and boots, 
Box of worms, lively and fat, 

All hail your hook in these old roots. 
Careless man, 
Mad as bran. 
Neither snap 
Nor flip flap." 

"We thank God, for these woods, these mountains, and 
these ever singing waters. They are not only the angler's 
Elysium, but the great medicine chest of nature." 

George Dawson. 



" We plunge in the crystal, our sport is begun, 

Our line, where that ripple shoots onward we throw, 
It sweeps to the foam-spangled eddy below, 
A tremor — a pull — the trout upward is thrown, 
He swings to our basket — the jrize is our own." 

Street. 



Sabbath Breaking — Night up a Tree — Forest Lessons- 
Fly Fishing — Good Night. 



YESTERDAY Gould went fishing with Be- 
craft's Dutch neighbor, Jake Meyers. The 
Dutchman, to combine profit with pleasure, 
drove three or four cows over the hills and 
through the woods to the meadows, that they 
might fill themselves with the rich grass while 



164 RANDOM CASTS. 



he was filling his tin pail with trout. The Dutch- 
man's lack of brains was more than counter-bal- 
anced by a superabundance of laziness. He was 
' too lazy to dig more than three worms for his 
day's fishing, but being a good bait fisherman, he 
really needed no more, for after he had captured 
two or three fish he would insert the hook in 
the fishes' eyes, tearing them out, and repeating 
the operation whenever necessary upon others 
as he caught them, so that he always dug his bait 
as fast as he caught his fish. If his usual good 
luck was any criterion, the bait he used was as 
taking as any other, although he spoiled the ap- 
pearance of his catch. Gould and his Dutch 
friend both paid dearly for their desecration of 
the Sabbath. 

Gould returned during the middle of the af- 
ternoon, wet, scratched, tired, discouraged, re- 
pentent, and with the proverbial ill luck that at- 
tends the unsuccessful fisherman. At every 
step, splash went his feet, driving the water 
through his bursted shoes. He had lost half a 



RANDOM CASTS. 165 



dozen flies in the tree-tops, barked his shins, lost 
his pipe, and finally, when crossing the stream 
on a fallen tree, stepped on a treacherous limb 
that snapped under his weight, and before he 
could recover his equilibrium, down, down he 
went, his hat floated away in the rapids, the tip 
of his rod was smashed, his clothes torn, his day's 
sport (?) finished. The crowning misfortune 
consummating a merited punishment followed, 
when, flashing through his mind came Senior's 
unheeded warning and advice. Back to Becraft's 
he came in no very amiable mood, looking 
rougher and raggeder than any tramp that ever 
cheeked a summer's living. His mishaps, though 
aggravating enough, and deservedly so, were 
insignificant in comparison to the complaint we 
had from the Dutchman, and to which we lis- 
tened while getting ready for our last day's fish- 
ing. 

After seeing his cows commence their feeding 
in the Big Meadows he left Gould and started 
for Alder Creek, and fished there until he had 



1 66 RANDOM CASTS. 

his tin pail full of fingerlings. It grew dark early 
for a storm was coming when he retraced his 
steps towards the meadows, intending to drive 
his cows back home with him. He found all but 
one, and started them over the hill towards the 
settlement, and then returned for the stray one. 
Now occasionally a bear from the same hills will 
make a nocturnal promenade through the settle- 
ment, and as Jake had a mortal fear of them, 
nothing would have induced him to continue his 
search had he been wise enough to have noticed 
the indications of the storm that was brewing, 
and the slight possibility of a visit from a bear. 
It was dark when he was on the mountain top, 
a sprinkle — down came the rain. We will let 
Jake relate his own experience : 

" You sees, I goes bake again for dot ret cow, 
shust pefore dark. I hade all odder cows but 
dot von, und she vas vay up der mountains some- 
dimes. Veil, I had got shust a leedle vays pey- 
ont dot odder sides ven I heard a pell, but mine 
golly, it vas odder man s cow all der times. Mine 



RANDOM CASTS. 167 



cow didn't got no pell. Bumby der rains falls 
und crows so awful tark, dot was awful hart, you 
could no sees your fingers by your own eyes. 
Veil, I lose der leedle bath, und vas vandering 
arount und vondering vere I vas, und bretty 
soon I sees von pig noise in der drees, und I 
tought sure dere vas a pear loose, so I climps 
me up a leedle dree youst as der pear comes snuf- 
fing town pelow. I climps up till I comes by a 
leedle limp not much vider as mine tumb, und I 
strattle dot leedle limp. Bumby der rains falls 
acain, und it schlides town dot dree I vas up mit 
und it comes schliding town, und der more 
vot it comes schliding town, der more tider 
vot I have to hold on mit der dree, und de vater 
runs town by mine neck und head und bake. 
Mine Golly ! dot vas hart, und me sidding on a 
leedle limp shust no vider as mine tumbs. How 
dot leedle limp did hurt. Town pelow vas dot 
tarn shaggy pear at der feet of der drees looking 
und vatching of me, und afery minutes I taught 
he climps up dot dree after me. All night long 



1 68 RANDOM CASTS. 



when der morning prcaks avay und der sun 
comes up mit its light, I sits on dot leedle limp 
not so vider as mine tumb. By golly ! how dot 
leedle limp do hurt. Ven it vas sun up enough 
as I could see to der ground, by tarn, der vas 
dot tam ret cow close by der foot of der tree 
und der drail not more as von feet away, 
und den I vas mat as everytings, after strad- 
tling dot leedle limp not so vide as mine tumbs 
all der night. Mine golly ! dot vas hart, und I 
says odder dimes I go looks for mine cows und 
she no comes bake pefore tark she may go to 
der tuyfel mit me." 

Leaving Gould repentant and Jake disgusted 
to condole with each other, Grey and Storm 
started down the creek. This day finishes our 
sport for the present. Our vacation has been 
''idle time not idly spent." 

The days and weeks passed here as we have 
passed them are rejuvenating to the old man, and 
for the young man is laying the corner-stone of 
perfect health. The man who loves to angle, to 



RANDOM CASTS. 1 69 



camp out and knock around in the woods, finds 
it not only a hospital and a dispensary, but also 
a gymnasium, a school and a church. He stud- 
ies nature in her varying" moods, in sunshine and 
in shadow. Everything animate and inani- 
mate which goes to create nature has for 
him a reason and a guidance. He learns the 
medicinal properties of plants, becomes familiar 
with ferns and flowers, and the sturdy trees. 
He learns the cry of the loon, the hoot of the 
owl, the notes of the blue jay and the cat-bird, 
and grows to know their habits. The west wind 
has its meaning and the east its warning, the 
clouds above their caution. The sighing wind, 
the ripple on the lake, the rustle of the leaves, 
whisper their secrets. The contraction or ex- 
pansion of the clover leaves is a harbinger of 
rain or sunshine; the opening or closing of the 
thistle heads and the chickweed foretells 01 
weather wet or dry. Even the smoke of his 
camp-fire restrains or prompts him. He be- 
comes so intimately acquainted with the buz- 



JO RANDOM CASTS. 



zing musquito, the biting black fly, and the 
minute midget, that they stick to him closer 
than a brother. He can time their coming to a 
certainty, he learns their color, size, age to which 
they attain, habits, number to the pound or bush- 
el, number of pounds some exceptionally healthy 
ones weigh, length of claws, and other particu- 
lars concerning them that only scientists inves- 
tigate. 

This forest life, "this looking through nature 
to nature's God,'' makes the angler sympathetic, 
gentle, a Christian ; and no wonder, for the 
unwritten book of God is always open to him, 
and insensibly, perhaps, he is learning some les- 
son, growing better and wiser, loving his fellow- 
men, loving the golden rule, which says, " Do 
unto others as you would that others should do 
unto you." 

Down below the old bridge, Grey stepped in- 
to the water. He looked a perfect picture as 
he stood knee deep in the running stream, and 
gracefully casting his flies. His well fitting 



RANDOM CASTS. 171 



coat displayed to the best advantage his broad 
shoulders, while the basket at his side, the 
chequered shirt-front and wide brimmed hat 
becoming him perfectly, r.dded a look of the 
true angler. Many and many a time have 1 
paused from my casting, to watch his graceful 
motion as he dropped his flies fifty or sixty feet 
away, dropped them with the ariness ol thistle- 
down, so lightly as to deceive even the gran- 
dees of the pool. It is the poetry of the gentle 
art. He is one of the few who never fail to 
conquer the usual impediments to fly-fishing, 
be it a high bluff directly behind him, a tree 
leaning over him, a contrary wind, or whatever 
obstacle the angler frequently meets. Plenty 
of good spots he finds that many would pass, 
pronouncing them impracticable from the diffi- 
culty of getting out line in that seducing man- 
ner the trout so love and reward. 

We hear of fly-throwers who can place their 
stretchers on a maple leaf twenty or twenty-five 
yards distant, and no part of the line or leader 



172 RANDOM CASTS. 



shall touch the water. We have yet to see that 
man. There will be some part of his line on 
the water if he attempts throwing that distance, 
right or left handed, as circumstances required, 
Grey could get out as much line as any one 
could, slightly checking it before it reached 
the water, to prevent a splash and keep it taut. 
The leader properly dyed never alarms the 
fish. Then, setting the hook with an almost 
imperceptible turn of the wrist, the result of in- 
stinct rather than of reason, for quick as 
thought, quickly as the nerves convey any sen- 
sation to the brain, you have no time to think 
until the hook is fastened, for a trout displays an 
immense amount of energy and abruptness in 
his suddenness. After you have felt the electric 
thrill and know you have hooked something, 
then you can study the situation, and reason 
tells you how to conduct the attack. 

Now, see just between those two rocks, and 
almost under the bank, Grey tosses his flies 
which alight soft as a shadow among the 



RANDOM CASTS. 173 

whirling eddies. But, an instant it rested life- 
less, when a heavy swirl betokened how well it 
had performed its mission. A deft turn of the 
wrist, the sudden whirl of the reel, the lengthen- 
ing line, the graceful curve of the rod, with now 
and then a momentary glimpse ot the hand^ 
some sides of a trout among the bright ripples, 
proves there is a dangerous customer to be dealt 
with. With lightning speed, almost the entire 
length of the line is unreeled, and at the first 
pause, Grey quickly tightens up, securing as 
much line as possible, when away goes the trout 
again, swimming in rapid circles, dashing down 
to the rocky bottom, and anon skimming on the 
surface, lashing the water like a harpooned 
whale, on a small, very small scale, breaking in 
every direction, up, down, and across stream, 
seeking for some vulnerable point, some weak 
spot through which he can escape. He seemed 
to grow more infuriated as life, and the line 
shorten. Every movement redolent of life and 
smacking of business. Never did demon strug- 



174 RANDOM CASTS. 



gle more desperately, but the fierce hook hangs 
with a tenacious grasp upon his jaws. His 
rushes becomes less and less dangerous. Slow- 
ly and surely he is nearing his fate, and with a 
last desperate break and a few spasmodic 
jumps, he turns on his side a defunct salmo-fonti- 
nalis. 

Plenty of little fellows, a few good-sized ones 
captured back of Joe Lanes', and a couple of 
what the natives call a old hunkers " altogether, 
well filled our creels, so as twilight commenced 
to set in the woodland gorges, we reel up, climb 
the high hill, cut across the meadow, and 
reached Becraft's in good season. We arrive 
with weary limbs and voracious appetites. 
Falstaff and his recruits were a kingly crowd in 
comparison. Supper was soon ready, and we 
paid it a practical compliment. Tarrare never 
dined with a more devouring and devastating 
appetite. 

The next move is to the front porch. Gould 
to smoke his cigarette, Grey and Senior to ex- 



RANDOM CASTS. 1 75 



patiate in glowing terms upon the brilliant 
days of our trip, and to keep mum about the 
unlucky ones. Storm to puff in silence over 
his briar-root, and regret that he had to go 
home to-morrow. We had caught our last 
trout, and there was naught left lor us to do, 
but to talk, and think, and thank, for the smiles 
of fortune, and the blessing God has vouch- 
safed us in giving health and strength to enjoy. 
The moon poured down its rays of ether 
light, flooding the trees, barns and fences, with 
silvery showers. Dew drops were clinging to 
the bushes, lilacs, on the clover and on the 
grass. 

" All things are hushed, as Nature's self l?y down, 
The mountains seem to nod their drowsy neads. 
The little birds in dreams, their songs repeat, 
And sleeping flowers beneath the night-dew sweat." 

In the holy hush of such an evening, witL 
the moon and stars shining, and beautiful as an- 
gel faces, the storms of earth forgotten, we may 
feel that there is something pi heaven, even in 
this wicked life. 

As the bright evening star dropped its face 
behind the wooded hills, seeming to say good- 
night, we wished each other a quiet rest. 



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